My Development Plan

[KevoMee]

Hi All,

I've to fill in my development plans in work for the next year. I know technically what I want to achieve but I'm sure there's a few non-technical courses/targets I should include... thing is, I don't have a clue what to put in.

I work in a large company on a team of 2 developing in house software. Nothing massive, mostly reporting applications or timesheet/Request systems. They include a big of everything, Security, Localistion, Web Services & we also have to maintain the servers. All is in .NET & C#.

I want to become certified in .NET & I also want to raise my knowledge in Oracle, as this is their DB.

So, in short does anyone have any ideas, as to what I should include in it? I kinda feel like I'm asking strangers which way my career should go but I just need a few pointers.

Cheers!
Kev.

 

[ThomasLafferty]

Hi there!
A good thing to do, assuming you want to stay with this company, is to make sure you align your development goals with the company's bottom line: profitability. Where do you see the business needs moving over the next year or so? If you are not sure, see if you can schedule a meeting with department management - particularly focusing on areas where you can take on projects to save time, money, labor, etc.

As I am sure you are aware, the reason ANY job exists is because an employer believes it is more cost effective to hire someone to do the work than 1)doing it him/herself 2) having a machine or piece of software perform the function or 3) doing without it. As a corollary, the reason you have the job is that [!]you personally[/!] are viewed as being more cost effective than the next available employee. In any business venture, you are not liable to go far wrong if you follow the money, so I would start by making sure that my goals were tied in to that.

One place you can start is by running an analysis of what might happen to the company if you were to die, quit or get fired today. If you detect that you would disappear from the radar screen without making much impact, then it's time to entangle yourself in work that matters to the company bottom line.

To help you get started, here's a link to a headhunter's career advice - I regularly recommend his site as he has a laser sharp focus on profit as it relates to finding work. He has a section entitled the Inside Scoop, but I would browse his entire site and take in as much of it as I could.

http://www.asktheheadhunter.com

Also, a nice site with brainstorming and analysis tools:

http://www.mindtools.com/pages/main/newMN_TMC.htm

Hope I have given you some food for thought...

Tom

Born once die twice; born twice die once.