My career has been a short one to date having only graduated in 2019. In that period, I’ve been able to work across numerous industries ranging from asset management to Insurance and Strategy Consulting and have actively received a ton of valuable and helpful career advice. However, one piece of advice that I’ve heard consistently across all industries and from mentors and senior individuals is the importance of being proactive and intentional with your career.

What does this mean?

Being proactive with your career is taking ownership of the circumstances and things within your control that will aid with your career development. This can mean many things such as identifying

Looking back over the first 5 years of my career, the biggest areas of growth and development were when I was proactive in my career, whether that be in taking extra responsibilities in work or moving industries when I felt that I wasn’t developing. At the same time, looking back at the times I’ve felt I’ve struggled in my career, I was passive with my career development and just letting the days go by.

Let me give you a personal anecdote. I knew from my first year at university I wanted to go into investment management so I proactively developed a list of the key things I would need to break in and worked backwards from there. These key things were a strong CV with some finance experience, a strong knowledge of financial markets and examples of my passion for it. I was able to get work experience at BlackRock which ticked off the work experience part, but more importantly, I proactively started a newsletter and blog on financial markets (this was what FO Perspectives initially was!), stayed up to date on the key trends across different asset classes such as the impact on QE on investment decisions and also started an investment WhatsApp group. Doing all this meant I was a strong candidate and was able to secure multiple investment management interviews.

So how can one be proactive with their career?

Well if you’re a student, think about where you want to be post university. If you’re looking to break into a field, think about what you need to get into it and then work backwards to know the steps you need to take to get them. This could mean networking with people in your desired fields, staying up to date with the relevant news and skills within your desired industry and being creative in getting the relevant work experience needed to get into your desired field.

If you’re currently working, being proactive would be actively looking at what you need to get promoted and intentionally hitting those requirements by doing the necessary extra steps that may require you to go above and beyond. Or it could be thinking about your long-term goals for your career and then identifying the key steps needed which could be moving roles or developing certain new skillsets to complement your current skills

So yeah, take this newsletter as a sign to take control of your career! if you want any advice or help with that we’re always free to help at FO Perspectives, just click the link here and book an intro call!

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