Career Planning over the decades

The very understanding of the term ‘career planning’ has been associated with pre-planning, steadfastness to promising opportunities and grabbing up opportunities at hand. The variable of human interest has been missing from the equation until the past decade when a start-up storm started brewing up.

This evolution also signifies that the stigma of having sketched out our lives till we turn 40 need not be valid everywhere, of course, society is diverse and minute evolutions are taking place everywhere, that needs planning and has monetary limits in their executions.

Until the last couple of decades, the concept of cities was sporadic. People were moving to cities from smaller towns and villages. They had to grab up every opportunity they had been given to make sure that their family enjoyed a square meal and so that they would have surplus for their parents back in their villages.

Meticulous planning in income and spending had to be done to save up for the future. Those were the times when career planning for most just meant money making and saving. As cities started to grow out of proportions, so did the opportunities.

An intermediate generation enjoyed a superfluity in opportunities. And as a rule of thumb, there came a saturation point where the people coming into cities exponentially overshot the jobs available.

And hence started the process of definition of ‘career planning’. People were forced to think about the opportunities available and taking up opportunities that enticed them with lucrative pays and bonuses.

The interesting factor was still largely overlooked. Every Tom, Dick, and Harry thronged IT companies that served overlords in countries elsewhere. Inflation was still a term which came disguised through those years.

The common IT employee could lead a comfortable life, send some back home and save up for the future. IT jobs made up the market. At an age of round holes, a dozen square pegs existed that started up non-IT companies and offered employability at lower salaries. As IT dads started settling down, came the next generation.

And hence, the current definition of ‘career planning’. Computer Science and IT aren’t the only courses offered by colleges. Though Engineering is the most sought after the stream, the diversification of it has given birth to newer opportunities.

A lot more square pegs have cropped up, providing opportunities for feeding interests. With IT dads settled down in cities, the current generation, in general, has monetary concerns a bit far from intimidating.

Working in IT companies has started to lose its former sheen. Now it means to consent to act as a piece of furniture. When used in the living room is no longer necessary, the furniture will be shifted to storage.

Working in an IT company as a fresher could be used as a launchpad for higher studies. However, it reduces the field of careers one can join without starting as a beginner.

Adding human interests to the equation crops up the necessity of planning much ahead or taking up whatever comes our way and either sticking to it till the end or making a courageous decision to walk out of the path.

There was an age when only monkeys could climb trees and elephants and fishes had to be schooled for it.

 

 

But, such is not the case anymore. Even the elephants and fishes can start making a living out of the tree, just that the fish needs to determine how long can it stay out of water.