Summarizing job-related goals can help you identify key areas of professional development necessary for achieving your career objectives. It gives you focus and direction, helps you communicate professional expectations with employers and assists you in charting your short- and long-term career goals.

Develop a Career Plan

Writing a career plan helps you evaluate your strengths and weaknesses and your likes and dislikes. It also allows you to identify the areas of your profession you want to zero in on. A career plan helps you narrow the scope of your professional life to pinpoint specific goals you want to achieve during a particular time frame. Part of the process of creating a career plan includes setting specific goals. For example, if you want to be a vice president of a mid-sized advertising agency by the time you’re 40, that's a specific, job-related goal. Your career plan will help you work backward to determine the steps you have to take in order to reach your objective.

Summarize Individual Goals

Once you develop a comprehensive career plan, pull out the sections related to job-specific goals and summarize each one based on criteria you set for yourself. For example, you may choose to summarize goals in bullet-point fashion or brief paragraphs that include the education, training or experience necessary for each goal. Or you may prefer to map out the steps up the corporate ladder you have to make in order to achieve your aims.

Summarize Career Objectives

Once you have a firm idea of the specific goals you'd like to achieve during your career, take all your individual goals and summarize them in a single career objective. For example, “I have a goal of becoming a vice president of a mid-sized marketing company by age 40. This requires obtaining a master’s degree in advertising and communication, spending at least 10 years in mid-level marketing corporate positions and building a statewide client base.”

Use Your Goal Summaries

Once you've summarized your career objectives, use them for different purposes. Develop a career objective or statement for your resume, use the summary to help with goal-setting with your current employer or use the summary in job interviews when talking to prospective employers about your long-term plans. Revisit your plans annually, or more frequently if you have major life changes, to ensure the course you’re setting for yourself is still on track, attainable and in line with your personal and professional needs.