Career Development is the lifelong process of managing learning, work, leisure, and transitions in order to move toward a personally determined and evolving preferred future.
In educational development, career development provides a person, often a student, focus for selecting a career or subject(s) to undertake in the future. Often educational institutions provide career counsellors to assist students with their educational development.
In organizational development (or OD), the study of career development looks at:
how individuals manage their careers within and between organizations and,
how organizations structure the career progress of their members, it can also be tied into succession planning within most of the organizations.
In today's world, more employers are looking for ways to facilitate career development and encourage their employees to drive their own careers.
In personal development, career development is:
" ... the total constellation of psychological, sociological, educational, physical, economic, and chance factors that combine to influence the nature and significance of work in the total lifespan of any given individual."
The evolution or development of a career - informed by (1) Experience within a specific field of interest (with career, job, or task specific skills as by-product) (2) Success at each stage of development, (3) educational attainment commensurate with each incremental stage, (4) Communications (the capacity to analytically reflect your suitability for a given job via cover letter, resume, and/or the interview process), and (5) understanding of career development as a navigable process. (Angelo J. Rivera)
"... the lifelong psychological and behavioral processes as well as contextual influences shaping one’s career over the life span. As such, career development involves the person’s creation of a career pattern, decision-making style, integration of life roles, values expression, and life-role self concepts."
