Career Business Plan

Do you encourage your clients to prepare a "Career Business Plan"? Perhaps you should.

"In all too many cases, the most important decisions about your career will be made at a time unknown to you, at a place where you are not present, by people who don't know you well," writes Dave E. Marley, author of "Promote Yourself! Creating a Personal Promotion Plan for Your Career." (Published 2002; currently out of print).

Marley writes that personal promotion efforts must have more than one focus; it's not enough to promote yourself inside your current circle or the company where you are currently employed, because companies fail, merge, and redirect themselves and their employees to different markets and industries.

The book defines professional equity as the career value you own -- your reputation, skills, experience, and contacts. Help your clients by emphasizing building "professional equity" -- those assets that establish your unique value.