Here’s an example of some materials I’ve used with my Coaching Clients. I find that these structured questions help set the stage for bold, practical thinking.

While this example is specific to financial services, the approach is generalizable any person’s hopes, skills and experience. Feel free to adapt the template.

Need a change? Look up. Write on the sky.

Career Planning Worksheet for <Your name here>

1. Describe your favorite job ever.
2. What is it you like best about your current role?
3. Describe your “soft skills.” (examples – Team leadership/building, conflict management, mentoring, etc)
   1. Give 2-3 examples of where you have used a soft skill? (Don’t limit to positive experiences – include disciplinary action/firing, if applicable)
   2. For each example, explain 
   3. How did it make you feel?
   4. How did it benefit the individual and or the organization?
4. Suspend disbelief for a moment – assume you have magic. 
   1. Describe your ideal next job.
   2. What current skills would you be using? 
   3. What new skills would you need to learn?
   4. Where would your job be?
   5. How much time would you spend each day on your work?

• Create a “Hard” skills list – you can edit/augment what I’ve got here

#	Skill	Description (you can add if you like)	Your Aptitude Level (1-10)
1	Credit Risk – Domain	Capital Markets, Prime Brokerage
2	Financial Risk – Domain	“
3	Margin – Domain	“
4	Regulation – Domain	Regulatory calendar & requirements, impacts on technology
5	Financial Data	Transactional, Market, reference, Economic, News, etc
6	Credit Risk – Systems Architecture	“
7	Financial Risk – Systems Architecture	“
8	Margin – Systems Architecture	“
9	Technology – Dev Ops	Note – 10 would be “I could design and build it myself”
10	Technology – Development – C, Java, Python,…	Note – 10 would be “I write code every day – part of my job description.”
11	Program Management – staff, vendors
12	Technology Financial Strategy, Planning Management
13	C-Level Management (“Managing Up”	Note – Important to keep this here
14	Data Science – AI, Data Mining (Product Owner Role)	Note- 10 would be “I manage the creation and evolution of data mining/ AI projects.
15	Data Science – AI, Data Mining (Developer Role)	Note – 10 would be – I create code at the direction of the product owner.
16	Data Science – AI, Data Mining (Project Manager Role)

• How do you feel about looking for other opportunities in your organization?
• What new skills do you think you need for your next job?
• How much financial freedom do you have to make a lateral / lesser comp move where you can add skills/ change focus?
• Other asks – 
  • Travel appetite?
  • Relocation?