By: Maggie Theisen

Career management? What’s that? This question was answered by Karen Kodzik at the Minnesota Women in Marketing Communications’ (MWMC) Learning Lunch this past Tuesday.

Karen, President and Owner of Cultivating Careers, began the event by stressing the importance of managing your career, no matter what stage it may be in. Volatile factors contributing the reasons why your career should be managed include a competitive market, budget restrictions, and a tough economy.

So how exactly do we manage our careers if we are in transition or looking to further our current role? Karen’s tips included keeping your skills current, fostering good relationships with your employer/boss, and knowing your career path and options within your company. This discussion forayed into self-reflection; are we proactively managing our careers, or reactively managing them? Karen provided crossroad triggers, both internal and external, to help the group answer the questions. These triggers included boredom, restlessness, depression, life changes, or loss of job. She stated that if attendees are feeling any of these factors it may be time to think about where you want to head in their career path.

The attendees then learned how to proactively manage their careers. Karen’s tips included communicating, showing off your skills at work, increasing your visibility, be likeable, foster good relationships with co-workers, be flexible within your duties, stay current, and have a “heads-up” mentality. Other pro-active management factors outside of the workplace consist of always having a plan B, keep your resume and LinkedIn account current, and always network.

The women in attendance left with valuable information about fostering their careers, whether they are looking for new work or looking to advance within their current role. Each attendee left with a copy of Karen’s book, valuable career tips, and new industry connections.