The 6 Month Check In
Posted by Kerri Birtch on March 5th, 2009
I cannot believe it’s been nearly 6 months since I started as an Account Coordinator with Thornley Fallis. But since there hasn’t been any rift in the time/space continuum that I know of, I must accept that it is so. Normally, I wouldn’t even remember such milestones, except here are TFC, we are required to have a 6 month review. There are some forms to complete and I will need to have a chat with my supervisor: the lovely and talented, social media ‘guru’, and British import extrodinaire – Dave Fleet. (Yes, I’m kissing up 
The basis of our chat will be about my goals.
Goals, uh…
I have to say, after a fair bit of personal reflection the past few months, I realize that I have very few goals at this time in my life. If I think of goals I used to have, I realize that I’ve actually met quite a few of them: Graduate university, get accepted to a Master’s program, get a job in the communications field, learn more about social media and the list goes on. While this has been extremely rewarding and I’m pleased with my accomplishments, I’m starting to wonder though, what do I do now?
I feel as though I’m at a very interesting point in my career. I need to start thinking about what do I want to accomplish in the long term. To be honest, I have never really been a person who looked at things long-term, and well, the mindset of a student doesn’t always allow for long term goals. Most of the time it was: Complete assignment next week, pass exams at the end of the term, get a summer job, move back to TO and do it all over again. But now that I haven’t been a student for a few years, I’m thinking it might be time to start taking myself seriously as a young professional. After all, it’s difficult to achieve your goals if you don’t sit down and figure out what it is you want.
But how exactly do I do that?
Suggestions are more than welcome here! I’m pretty sure I’m not the only young professional out there who is feeling some pressure to become more goal-oriented. How do you define your goals? Please feel free to share your thoughts.
March 5th, 2009 » 7:07 pm
Kerri, Over time, I’ve found that most people neglect the one thing that is most important to their long term career, thinking through what they want and how they hope to get it.
And that’s why we have mandatory reviews every six months.
And, yep, there are forms to fill out. It’s hard work to think through where we want to go. Over time, I’ve found that filling out a questionnaire about this forces us to actually think about ourselves, where we are, whether we’re happy with our career path, and what we want to do next.
If you invest the time to do this, you can be darned sure that Thornley Fallis will make our best efforts to help you achieve your plan. And that’s a promise.
By the way, I’m glad that you chose Thornley Fallis. You make us a smarter group through your contribution.
March 5th, 2009 » 10:17 pm
Hi Joe,
Thanks for the words of encouragement. I’m definitely making an effort to take the process seriously and consider what it is I’m hoping to achieve in my long term career goals. Glad to be a part of the TFC team!
-Kerri
March 5th, 2009 » 10:51 pm
I’m feeling about the same way. I’ve achieved a lot of the goals I was working towards a year ago, and now I’m thinking “where do I go from here?” I’m starting a mastermind group in April with five other young professional women to try and figure it all out.
Congratulations on your six monthaversary!
March 6th, 2009 » 1:22 pm
Kerri,
I will be graduating in PR in April, and your comments on “long-term goals” really resonated with me. Here at school, I find myself in survival mode–only thinking about the current day or week. Thinking long-term simply gets overwhelming at times.
Long-term goals require a certain amount of confidence in yourself to lift your gaze above the here-and-now, and optimistically plan for the future. They require introspection to figure out what you really enjoy and desire to do. In short, they require time, work and sincerity.
Maybe that’s why I haven’t made any yet…
Speaking of, I should go write a paper for class!
March 7th, 2009 » 7:49 pm
It can be tough to set goals – it really requires you to sit down and think about what you want to achieve, and they don’t come easily. However, I’ve found that once you have those goals it makes the daily ups and downs of agency life infinitely easier to handle as you can see past that and look at the big picture of where you want to get.
One way to make it easier is to think of different timeframes – what do you want to achieve in the next six months; in the next year; in the next five or ten years (or whatever timeframes work for you)? As you cross off the short-term goals, you can move the others forward.
I’ll second Joe’s comments – it’s great having you as part of the TFC team.
Oh, and the kissing-up will get you no-where… ok, fine, maybe it will