In your career, you’re never on your own. Many people can help you, including people in your network, your family or a friend.

 

Also, there are lots of resources you can use to support you at work. These include great books, audiobooks, podcasts, YouTube videos and learning channels such as LinkedIn learning.

 

We've never had more information available to us. And yet, our life and career choices can seem even more confusing than ever. We are drowning in information but starved of knowledge.

 

Let's look at a curated list of career resources available to you right now in 5 categories:

 

-           Internet resources, including YouTube

-           Books

-           Podcasts

-           Your manager, HR, Mentor

-           Professional support

Internet resources, including YouTube

There is an abundance of resources available on the internet. A simple google search for ‘Career Planning’, for example, returns more than 1.3 billion results. Of course, most of us never look further than the first page of returns but even so, it can be difficult to find responses here that match your need.

 

This is where search skills are vital. You are more likely to find what you are looking for if you use some of the more advanced google techniques. I, therefore, suggest you review this google help page before you begin your search, it will save you hours and get you to the good stuff quicker.

Video and YouTube, in particular, is helpful for much more than entertainment and can be a powerful aid in your career.  In fact, YouTube has endless videos and channels that can deal with every aspect of your career. 

 

Videos tend to be made and shared by knowledgeable and highly motivated individuals, such as Linda Raynier, who produces videos to help you succeed at an a job interview or to write CVs that gets noticed; or Vanessa Van Edwards, who deals with how to develop the skills needed to be more emotionally intelligent.

LinkedIn is a great tool and resource for your career and LinkedIn Learning, which you can try free for a month, provides access to high-quality career-enhancing courses.

Other great websites I recommend:

FutureLearn

FurtureLearn partners with universities, institutions and industry leaders to create world-class courses to help people with their careers. They’ve created a FREE course with Leeds University called the Essential Skills for Your Career.

Featured in the UK government’s Skills Toolkit collection, this course helps learners to take their careers to the next level. 
 
You will learn how to navigate the process of applying for jobs and interviews, consider the importance of transferable skills and create the right professional networks.

 This is a self-guided course so you learn at your own pace and I can highly recommend it.

 

 

I have previously written on the best books to read in your career. You can find the blog piece here.

 

One of the most challenging aspects of career management is, well, choosing a career or deciding what’s next for you. Two of the best books on navigating the world of career selection are:

 

-  Working Identity - Herminia Ibarra

-  The Squiggly career – Helen Tupper and Sarah Ellis

Working Identity is still probably the best I have read on this subject. It’s an old book, and I have read it many times and highlighted the best bits.

 

Both books are highly recommended, and for many people, this may be enough to support you in understanding yourself better and making intelligent next steps in managing your career.

 

The steps needed to secure a job include CV preparation, job application writing, and succeeding at a job interview. All these steps can be fairly alien if you are not used to them. Thankfully there are a lot of books available to help you in this area and two of the best are:

 

Both of these books are useful in helping you to prepare your job application and CV and also to get you ready for your interview. Preparation is the key, and therefore, these books are highly recommended.

Having decided on a career and succeeded in securing a role that ticks all your boxes there are still many challenges to enjoying your role and succeeding at work over the long term. Two of the best books that can support you with these challenges are:

 

 

 

Listening to podcasts is an easy way to find information and support for your career. Podcasts are free, and you can multitask while listening to them. Here are my recommendations for the most valuable podcasts for your career.

Your Bravo Career

Ever wondered how you can love your job and build a great career? Learn how with my Your Bravo Career podcast about why your career matters, how you can enjoy what you are doing each day at work and how to build a great career along the way.

 

 

Elizabeth Day celebrates things that haven’t gone right. Every week, a new guest discusses their failures and how that’s helped them succeed. 

Squiggly Careers

Sarah Ellis and Helen Tupper, together with well-known guests, share very helpful career advice.

Ctrl Alt Delete

Career inspiration from Emma Gannon, who speaks to experts and thought leaders about their careers and their take on what’s going on in the sector. 

Eat Sleep Work Repeat

This series looks at how we can make working environments better. In each episode, Bruce Daisley chats to experts about how we can make changes in workplace cultures for businesses of all sizes. 

Your manager can and should support you with your career aspirations, helping you with opportunities and encouraging you to learn and develop. In reality, this can take many forms:

-       Taking a personal interest in your career goals

-       Promoting your learning and development

-       Supporting you to find mentoring and job shadowing opportunities

-       Assisting and facilitating a good work-life balance

Talk to your manager about your career aspirations and ask for support in dealing with the challenges you might have and reaching the next stage in your career.

This will help you to think through career issues you want to discuss ahead of time.

 

Of course, there are times when professional support is appropriate and chief amongst the list of services you could seek is that of the professional coach.

 

One of the reasons for this is that your career situation is unique to you and applying generic advice from, say, a book or podcast can sometimes be hit and miss.

 

Working with a good career coach can be life-changing and help you discover what your best life at work looks like, making the most of your skills, experience, values, and aspirations.

 

Whether you’re working for a large or small organisation or currently looking for your next role, working with a career coach can set you on the right path to feeling happier, more fulfilled and rewarded at work.

 

The range of issues a career coach can help you with include:

 

-       Supporting you to make a big leap in your career

-       Working with you to look at your career options

-       Helping you to deal with the blocks you may have around your career success

-       Assisting you to overcome the fear of making the next step to something better

-       Supporting you when you are ‘stuck in a rut’ at work - maybe you are in a ‘good job’, but not a good job for you!

 

If you are interested in finding out more about career coaching with me, have a look at my website to see the many ways I can help you in your career.

If you are unsure about career coaching, let’s have an informal chat.

 

Bye for now!

 

Mark