Welcome to Unit 9, our last live Seminar: Professional Development Craig Owens, Prof C

Unit 9 Discussion about early, mid and late career goals Final Project Seminar Questions?

Applying the learning! What was the most significant thing you learned in last week’s discussion about advocating for state and local funding for a not- for-profit service?

The Final Project – Due in Unit 9 For your final project, you will write a reflection paper from the point of view of a human service professional in his or her last job in the field. You can choose to be a Chief Executive Officer, or supervisor, or any other job that interests you. The purpose of your paper is to provide advice for others in your agency who are just beginning their careers in human services. You will include specific information from your Unit 3 project about using effective coordination between agencies in the community for service delivery. You will also describe some of the best methods for providing direct service to clients using the information from your Unit 6 project. You will describe the importance of advocating for the needs of the people in your local community (and for the agencies that serve them). In the last part of the paper, describe at least two of the most important lessons that you learned in working with people in all of your human service jobs. Your project should be between 1800 and 2400 words in length. Please use the Kaplan Library Academic Search Premier database to find at least two articles from peer- reviewed journals. You should also use a minimum of two reliable websites. A good starting point for reliable Internet sources is our government website at

Key concepts in Professional Development Each human service professional must participate in annual, bi-annual, and one-time trainings in order to satisfy legal requirements to earn or maintain certifications (individual or agency). There are trainings that individual human service professionals will want to attend to increase job knowledge and skill. There will also be trainings that human service professionals must attend as an obligation to their agency—to continue to receive public money of any kind, agencies must adhere to strict training standards.

Cont.. Because agency resources are usually limited, human service professionals are expected to track and plan their own training activities (though agencies will pay for legally mandated training). What are some creative ways you can manage your own ongoing training and development?

Cont… Professional activities include taking college classes, attending agency trainings, attending conferences or workshops designed to help human service professionals to strengthen skills, or participating in community coalitions or other advocacy activities.

Cont.. Additionally, most agencies use some form of annual evaluation that is used to gauge employee growth and performance. At some point during the year, professionals write and submit professional goals and plans for meeting them.

Your Professional Development Career Planning Early Career Late Career Mid Career

What is one of your early (1-3 years) career goals? S pecific M easurable A ction oriented R easonable T ime Bound

What is one of your mid (3-5 years) career goals? S pecific M easurable A ction oriented R easonable T ime Bound

What is one of your late (5-10 years) career goals? S pecific M easurable A ction oriented R easonable T ime Bound

Looking Back What was most helpful to you in these Seminars and in this Class in general?

KEEPKEEP SMILINGSMILING Stay in touch,