Every step up in your career happens because of your professional development.
Growing your skills, adapting to changing job markets, and narrowing your expertise are all contributors to successes like promotions and new positions. And while much of your on-the-job skill acquisition happens naturally, creating an intentional professional development plan (PDP) can help build a targeted path to your specific career goals.
A thoughtful plan identifies where you currently stand in your career and pinpoints goals, resources, and opportunities to advance. It’s an intentional process that requires self-reflection and realistic goal-setting, but the hard work will pay off — often literally.
What’s a professional development plan?
A PDP is a comprehensive document outlining your skills and competencies alongside your short-term and long-term professional goals. This honest self-assessment allows you to identify what professional development is necessary to move your career forward, laying the foundation for a roadmap of realistic, actionable steps to support continuous learning.
5 benefits of professional development plans
Creating a professional life that excites and motivates you requires thoughtful reflection on your past, present, and future, and a PDP hosts that knowledge. It documents your skills and offers a space for goal-setting, giving you the tools you need to work more effectively. Here are five reasons to build your own:
1. Establish a sense of direction
The hustle of your everyday responsibilities can sometimes make you lose focus on long-term objectives. A PDP helps you stay future-minded, providing clear goals and actionable steps that reduce the chance of languishing or drifting off your career path.
2. Involve others in your learning
Involving your manager or supervisor in the process can catalyze valuable conversations about your development needs. Talking to them could also give you professional development ideas you wouldn’t otherwise consider.
Your openness and interest in developing new skills, implementing SMART goals, and improving your ability to perform your current roles is a powerful signal for your organization. It shows that you’re interested in bettering yourself and the team, encouraging your employer to give you the growth opportunities you need.
3. Improve engagement
Developing your professional abilities and tracking progress feels good. But it’s about more than a sense of pride. According to a report from Frontiers in Psychology, career growth is positively linked to job engagement, meaning a PDP can help you connect to and enjoy your job. If you’re stuck in a rut or feel like your position could be a dead-end, professional development could be just what you need for deeper job satisfaction.
4. Anticipate roadblocks
There will always be bumps in your career journey, and you can’t foresee them all. But understanding your current skills and what you need to develop for professional growth helps you spot potential problems or gaps. You’ll build a resilient mindset through anticipation rather than sudden changes.
5. Create urgency for growth
Big, long-term goals can feel overwhelming and leave you unsure where to begin. Through a PDP, you can write an action plan and break big objectives into small, measurable goals. Time-sensitive actions can instill you with a sense of urgency and progression, turning “someday” goals into “today” objectives.
Professional development plan versus leadership development plan
Both professional and leadership development plans focus on nurturing career growth, but they center on different skills and timelines. Here’s a breakdown of their biggest distinctions to help you decide which action plan is better for you:
- Scope: A PDP can cover a range of skill-related ambitions, from becoming a better communicator to learning hard skills. But a leadership development plan has a more narrow focus on developing leadership capabilities, like project management, emotional intelligence, or employee development strategies.
- Skills versus behaviors: While a PDP may include a mix of hard and soft skills, a leadership development plan focuses on exclusively soft skill behaviors like effective communication, confidence, and decision-making.
- Accountability: While you may bring a mentor or manager on board when creating a PDP, the onus to set goals and track progress will most fall on your shoulders. A leadership development plan tends to be more collaborative and may include regular feedback from superiors, coaching, and organizational benchmarks.
How to write a professional development plan in 6 steps
Real progress takes a combination of planning and hard work. Following a step-by-step process can make creating your PDP easier. Here are six steps:
1. Self-assessment
Developing an action plan begins with an honest self-evaluation. This isn’t a cursory glance at your resume or CV — it’s a deep dive into your skills, knowledge, and interests.
Your self-evaluation sets the tone for the rest of your strategic planning, which means it’s important to be intentional about your goals and honest about your current strengths and weaknesses. This will help you identify what you need to improve to effectively advance in your career.
To develop a better understanding of your current skill set, personality, or interests, consider the following activities:
2. Set goals
After evaluating your current skills and knowledge, use that information to develop clear goals. One way to do this is by choosing one large, long-term objective, like getting a promotion or switching industries, and breaking it up into smaller, more achievable pieces.
Here’s a guide to different types of goals:
- Long-term: This is your finish line, which could take months or even years. Going back to school to complete a master’s degree or transforming a side hustle into a full-time job are good examples that require several milestones to complete.
- Mid-term: These can take a few weeks or a couple of months to accomplish and usually represent significant changes in your professional growth. If you want to pursue a master’s degree, mid-term goals may be to create a financial plan to afford the extra cost of tuition or reorganize your work schedule with your current employer.
- Short-term: Your short-term goals can be daily or weekly tasks. If you want to turn your side hustle into a full-time job, short-term goals could be opening an LLC, contacting your network for advice, or implementing a financial tracking system.
While defining your goals, you can use the SMART technique to develop specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound objectives. This will help you track your progress and make sure the goals you’re setting are actually achievable.
Ambition is a valuable characteristic, but be careful not to overload yourself. Taking on several big, long-term objectives at once can be counterproductive, leaving you feeling overworked to the point of burnout. Instead, work toward one or two goals at a time.
3. Strategize
With your self-assessment and goals in hand, write down exactly what you need to do to improve your skills, expand your know-how, or broaden your network to reach your objective.
During this process, write everything down you can think of, whether that’s attending a networking event, spending 30 minutes per day on a new skill, or filling out the sign-up sheet for a new seminar. Brainstorm and narrow down your ideas to the most impactful. Then you can organize your time with productivity in mind.
4. Examine opportunities for growth
Your strategies form the framework, but your resources are your building materials. This step involves writing down every tool you have access to that can help you meet your objective. Here are some development opportunities examples that can be important resources for growth:
- Training and certification programs that broaden your knowledge
- Webinars, workshops, and other professional development activities that improve your industry knowledge or skill set
- Conferences, networking events, and collaborative projects that strengthen relationships with colleagues
- Mentorship and coaching relationships that invest in your growth with guidance and support
- Social media platforms like LinkedIn, Instagram, or YouTube where you can connect with your target audience and promote your personal brand
5. Build a timeline
Autonomy over your professional development isn’t always a good thing. Another article from Frontiers in Psychology reports that procrastination is a common problem for tasks that require self-regulation, like personal goal-setting.
Creating a schedule helps you stick to your objectives and stay accountable. Hard deadlines signal that your development is as important as your daily work tasks, which can help you stay on top of them. Try tying them to daily, weekly, and monthly milestones, seeking a balance between challenging yourself and being realistic about your energy. And you can also share your schedule with an accountability partner for an extra layer of support.
6. Track your progress
Schedule regular check-ins with yourself to track your progress. Remember, your professional development plan isn’t set in stone. You may find you need more time or additional resources along the way. Flexibility with your plan (and yourself) will help you improve and grow.
2 professional development plan examples
Although your professional growth process is unique, you can still use templates and examples to help visualize what your PDP could look like. Here are two different examples to help you get started:
1. Recent college graduate
Entering the job market means a whirlwind of new learning experiences and information. To lean into the professional world, try setting smaller goals that focus on your transition. Here’s what the structure of a new grad PDP could look like:
Self-assessment
- I joined the company one month ago
- I feel excited but overwhelmed
- I don't know how to make a place for myself on the team and contribute to projects
Goals
- Cultivate a professional reputation as a trustworthy and hardworking team player within three months
Resources
Strategies
- Request a monthly 1:1 with my manager to understand how I can improve
- Be proactive in team meetings, offering constructive ideas
- Meet deadlines and produce high-quality work to demonstrate reliability
- Build rapport with team members with open communication and active listening
Timeline
- Weekly: Introduce myself to two team members and ask about their work
- Monthly: Attend a seminar on emotional intelligence to improve communication skills
- End of three months: Check in with supervisor to identify areas for continued growth
2. Career changes
A career change requires flexing your transferable skills and learning new ones entirely, which means there are lots of goals to set along the way. Here’s how to structure a plan focused on skill-building:
Self-assessment
- I want to leave a job in finance and transition into data science
- I have strong analytical skills but lack specific technical skills and credentials
Goals
- Bring up my competitive edge against more experienced professionals within six months
Resources
- Online platforms, courses, and certifications
- Networking events and industry seminars
- Externship opportunities to shadow a data scientist
- Freelance or part-time opportunities in data science that can provide hands-on experience
Strategies
- Learn a common coding language, like Python
- Attend industry seminars to meet professionals that can give me insight into industry needs
- Take on one freelance project
Timeline
- Within two weeks: Enroll in a coding class and join a data science group on LinkedIn
- Within three months: Secure a freelance data science project
- Within six months: Complete coding class, update resume to reflect new skills, and actively look for job opportunities
Plan for success
A professional development plan provides more than a guide to improve your job performance. It’s a technique that helps you check in with yourself and stay in line with your interests and aspirations. The progress you make isn’t only to land a promotion, show up for your team, or develop a new skill — it’s about finding the intrinsic motivation to continuously learn.
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