Mid-Career Manager Health Check
From a demographics perspective mid-career managers can be classified from late thirties through to age groups in forties and fifties.
You know you've hit mid-career status when you've been through several company reorganisations or the latest corporate strategy handed down no longer fills you with the excitement as it once did.
When you've reached mid-career level, you'll likely have become an expert in your chosen field. You may have worked your way up into a managerial level, and you'll likely have a reasonable salary, perks, and conditions that illustrates your success.
More Meaning and Purpose
Yet, despite the success, mid-career status is also the time when people can become unsettled as they re-evaluate their lives. They look for more meaning and purpose with their life and work.
If you're at this stage, it's a good idea to conduct a mid-career health check. Just like visiting the doctors for a check-up, you can do the same for your career. After all, its not often mid-career level managers perform a career health check. Its an essential part of health and well being.
A career health check is a series of diagnostic checks you make to ensure everything is in order. From a career perspective, this involves setting time aside to ask yourself some meaningful questions. You need to write your answers in a journal or somewhere which can be reflected upon at a later date. Writing enables you to examine your thoughts in depth, it helps with self reflection and provides clarity.
10 Meaningful Questions
1. What do you like about your work, what's of most interest?
2. What do you dislike most about your work?
3. What are your relationships with your manager and colleagues like?
4. Has your work situation affected your life outside of work?
5. When you talk about your work with others are you positive or negative?
6. What do friends and family think of your career situation?
7. What would you like to change about your current job/career situation?
8. Do you know what role you'd like next? If so, what is it?
9. What steps have you taken towards obtaining your next career move?
10. Are there any threats to your current job? i.e., performance warnings, redundancy
Summarise
Once you've written down the answers, write a summary about the answers you've written. Conclude by committing to act. This may involve making no changes (may not be an option with your employer), making an adjustment to your work, or committing to something else entirely.
Follow Up
And lastly, all the work and reflection you've done with your mid-career health check will be wasted if you don't follow through. Make a monthly recurring diary date to check your progress.