Developing your skills begins with assessing which skills are important for your desired career development. Read about career skills in the self-assessment section of this website. Speak with your supervisor or manager and other career mentors to identify the types of skills that will help move you forward in your career.
Skill Development means developing yourself and your skill sets to add value for the organization and for your own career development. Fostering an attitude of appreciation for lifelong learning is the key to workplace success. Continuously learning and developing one's skills requires identifying the skills needed for mobility at Cal, and then successfully seeking out trainings or on-the-job opportunities for developing those skills.
Your development should follow the 70-20-10 rule:
70% of your development should come from on-the-job activities and action learning. This can include development experiences like managing a project, serving on a cross-functional team, taking on a new task, job shadowing, job rotation, etc.
20% of your development should come from interactions with others. This includes having a mentor, being a mentor, coaching, participating in communities of practice, serving as a leader in a staff organization, etc.
10% of your development should come from training, including classes, seminars, webinars, podcasts, conferences, etc.
Once you have identified the skills you need to develop to achieve your career goals, your next step is identifying how you will develop your skills. The two main avenues for developing your skills are through the following:
While education and training are important to skill development, it is also known that only 10 percent of adult learning happens in the classroom, from books, tapes, or online learning activities. This is often because learning in these formats is more passive. Most adult learning, a full 70 percent, happens by doing. Learning by doing can take place through on-the-job and leadership experiences.
Following are examples of on-the-job and leadership experiences that can help you develop a range of skills and competencies.
On-the-Job Experience Examples
Leadership Experience Examples
These are just some examples of developmental experiences that can help you develop your skills. See additional examples of development experiences in this Experience Inventory handout (PDF).
The unique experiences that can help you progress toward your career development goals will be created by you, in conjunction with your supervisor or manager. Learning how to communicate to your supervisor that you are open to and desire development experiences is important to getting the opportunity to develop your career skills.
Show openness by being receptive to new ideas and suggestions, by admitting to your need for improvement, and by actively seeking your direct supervisor/manager's feedback. Keep in mind that the end goal is your career development, not the coaching process itself. Even if it's difficult to hear constructive criticism in the short run, if it helps to create development experiences for you it will help your career development as a whole.
Read the steps below for details on how to manage a developmental experience.