Reinvention Tip #6: Build a Vision Board of Your Ideal Career

During my 12+ years as a career coach, I've worked with all different types of personalities and learning styles.  Some of my clients create their "a-ha" moments by talking through their confusion, others find journaling to be effective and still others find their lightbulb moments when they are immersed in quiet thought. The truth is that there is no one magic potion that speeds up this process.  

Career discovery is a journey, and like any other personal journey you complete, it pays to try different techniques to create the results you desire. If you are having difficulty identifying your career goals, you might benefit from building a career vision board.  

For those of you unfamiliar with this concept, a vision board is a collection of visual images (photos, paintings, pictures, etc.) displayed on a bulletin board or poster as a graphic representation of your dreams and ambitions.  Once you've designed the board, displaying it in a prominent place will help serve as a daily reminder of your ambitions and career goals.

Creating a vision board is easy and fun.  There is a whole industry available to help you build your vision boards (software, templates, etc.) but I personally prefer the old-fashioned glue and paste methodology.  Here is a simple four-step guide to building a vision board:

1. Collect the images:  Cut out photos and meaningful phrases from magazines.  Look for pictures of people doing activities/occupations you find enjoyable and pictures that represent the type of work environments/people/work outfits/ or companies you'd like to be associated with.  
2. Arrange the images on the board:  You might want to group the images into categories representing different aspects of your career.  For example,in one corner put photos depicting the type of office you'd like to work in and in another corner include photos of the types of people you want to work with or have as clients.  Be sure to save space for an area where you can display photos illustrating some of the benefits you look forward to enjoying as part of your career.
3. Glue the pictures:  Once the photos are in place, add-in phrases or words that relate to your career goals.  Feel free to include references to people whose careers you admire and would like to emulate.
4. Display the board in a prominent place:  Post the board in an area where you will see it on a daily basis.

Have fun with this.  And if you have already developed a vision board, I invite you to write your reactions to this project in the comments section of this blog.

Comments

[chaz]

Yes! Awesome idea. I made TWO smaller (more manageable!) vision boards – one for my office and one for home. I found that using more pictures and less words worked the best for me. I’m also going to try to ‘change the landscape’ of the boards from time-to-time to keep them fresh.

For extra inspiration I went for some good-looking cork boards with custom frames on them that I picked out online at http://www.wholesalecustomframe.com/ . I’m sure there are other places as well, but FWIW this place was pretty cheap.