CHANGE MANAGEMENT

Change Management

Change Management

Introduction

Awareness is a central concept in career development. It has been defined as a relatively complete and accurate perception of individuals' own qualities and the characteristics of their environment. The two types of awareness identified in the literature are self-awareness and environment awareness. Self-awareness refers to the realistic and accurate perception of one's interests, values, skills, limitations, and lifestyle preferences. In its most basic form, self-awareness requires individuals to take the time to develop insights into themselves and assess what is meaningful to them in their lives. Both self-awareness and environment awareness are inarguably important for successful career decision making and career management. Different theorists have used different constructs to refer to self-awareness such as self-concept, self-image, vocational identity, and self-observation generalization.

Role Of Self-Awareness In Career Development

All major career development models have attempted to explain how individuals obtain and utilize self-knowledge to make career choices and shape their career development. A fundamental assumption that has guided most, if not all, major theories of career development is that self-knowledge is essential for making career progress and developing satisfying careers. Similarly, most of the models of career management subscribe to the notion that career success and satisfaction will most likely be achieved by individuals who develop insights into themselves and their work environments. Self-awareness also plays a critical role in self-management models. Simply put, self-management has been described as a process of influencing oneself. It encompasses self-assessment, self-monitoring, self-evaluation, and other related processes.

In order to fully appreciate the role of self-awareness in career development, it is important to first understand the nature of contemporary careers. There have been a number of environmental changes that have had a profound influence on the basic foundation of personal and career development. For example, it has been widely documented that the rapidly changing workplaces, combined with organizational, technological, and social transitions, have left few external benchmarks of effective career development and have fostered the trend toward self-managed careers.

Furthermore, with changes in the psychological contract and traditional organizational opportunity structures, changes in the meaning of career success, and greater awareness of the impact of family and lifestyle issues on one's career, employees have been compelled to design their own personal and career development plans. This has been accompanied by limited assistance from organizations for the development and management of these career plans. In such rapidly changing and uncertain times, there has been an increased pressure on employees to develop a set of career competencies that would enable them to develop insights into themselves and their environment. Such career competencies are believed to be important in achieving career success and satisfaction.

Self-awareness is important for career development for reasons other than the ones identified above. Self-awareness, conceptualized as both a personality trait and a skill, has been argued to be critical in regulating individual performance and achieving managerial excellence. A thorough awareness of one's interests, values, talents, and lifestyle preferences enables individuals to set appropriate career goals, develop appropriate career strategies, and regulate their behavior ...