Personal development plan Sample for it
By C. Gita Bosch, PhD
The Question
Do you know with certainty that you are on track to graduate from your undergraduate program armed with the skills you need for the next step in your career? This question is not only about academic/vocational preparedness, it is also about professional preparedness to take that next step. In addition to your instructive curriculum, you need to be armed with professional competencies that are not career specific, but rather those needed to function in any professional setting. These skills, also known as transferable skills, include proficiencies such as oral communication, writing skills, public speaking, conflict resolution, giving and receiving feedback, teamwork, management and leadership skills, organizational skills, and time management, among many others. You also must be competent in setting goals and prioritizing.
The Answer
An effective tool that you can use help ensure you acquire the academic foundation and transferable skills is to develop an Individual Development Plan (IDP), which will help enhance and improve academic and professional performance by identifying goals, assessing strengths and weaknesses, defining didactic/technical and professional skills necessary to reach those goals, the available opportunities to optimize reaching those goals, and the skills gaps that can derail your goal-oriented strategies.
An IDP serves as a strategic plan, not only for your undergraduate years, but also for your continued educational and professional careers. It can provide motivation and serve as a roadmap to your success by helping you establish realistic goals, strategies, milestones, and timelines to reach those goals. An IDP requires ongoing evaluation and assessment and is thus a dynamic document that is regularly reviewed and updated.
Individual professional development plans have been used in the corporate arena for a very long time. They are part of Performance Appraisal systems that are used to provide feedback and to set goals for individual employees. In recent years, IDPs have become an integral part of postdoctoral training in many institutions in an effort to help prepare fellows for their next steps and future careers. Recent years have also seen an increased use of IDPs for junior faculty.
