- Reflect
Analyse where you’re at with your career and how you feel about it. If you find yourself thinking, “Why am I here, doing what I’m doing when this clearly doesn’t suit me? My relationship with this job is purely a means to an end. This is not what I thought I wanted for my career” then you know it could be a good time to start making changes.
- Plot Your Progress
Ask yourself, “How did I actually get here? How have I arrived into this place and how did I fall into this period of stagnation? Why did I let that happen? What could I have done to stop it happening? What can I do to get out of it?”
- Make an End Before Making a Start
In order to fully move on, we need a clean break before making a new beginning. Don’t hold yourself back with thoughts about the last stage of your career but instead get ready to move on emotionally and mentally to your next challenge.
- Give Yourself Credit
As the International Coach Federation puts it, every individual is resourceful, creative and whole. You need to accept that this applies to you.
- Allow Yourself to Shine
Once you accept you’re resourceful, creative and completely whole, what can you do about exploring your strengths and picking out those things that really shine? We all have our moments; we’re all differently coloured diamonds. Some of us still need quite a lot of work to shine ourselves.
- Be Alert to Opportunities
When you’re stagnant, you’re looking at your feet. You cannot lift your eye-line up to see what’s going on around you. Consciously decide to take more notice of what’s going on and you might spot opportunities you wouldn’t have otherwise.
- Be Curious
Make the effort to find somebody or something in your work that you’re intrigued by and interested in. This can encourage you to take more of an active interest in other areas of your career.
- Connect with Others
When you’re in a period of stagnation, it can be hard to get perspective on what’s going on. You tend to think very much within yourself. Connecting with someone such as a mentor, career coach or someone else you trust can help you to work out what’s going on and to come up with some fresh views and ideas by talking it through with that individual.
- Think About the Future
Make a move towards understanding what the future looks like for you. The trick is working out how to bring the future into the here and now and how to plan for it. As well as looking at the long term future, consider what you want the very next step in your career to be. What do you do next to make that next step happen?
About the author
Simon North is the Founder of Position Ignition and the Career Ignition Club. Position Ignition is one of the UK’s leading career development and career planning companies. The Career Ignition Club offers a range of career support tools, advice and e-learning materials for its members. Follow Simon North and his team on twitter @PosIgnition and get more advice from him on their Career Advice Blog.