What we all need to understand about careers

When I completed a PG Cert in Career Development, I expected to gain knowledge and credibility in supporting doctors. What I didn’t anticipate was the passion it would spark for helping all doctors build the skills to thrive in their careers.

Career development is about more than choosing a specialty—it’s about self-awareness, decision-making, and understanding how we want to show up in both work and life.

As a senior trainer, I felt confident mentoring colleagues in Emergency Medicine, but I struggled to support those exploring non-traditional paths. Like most medics, my career choices were shaped by instinct, role models, and life circumstances. When I began to fall out of love with my specialty ten years into my consultant job, I had no structured way to navigate change without a hit to my self-esteem and well-being.

Career theory, at its core, helps us make decisions based on our values, strengths, and interests—ensuring our careers align with who we are. The value of a career in which we thrive is backed up by research; job satisfaction boosts performance (Hooley, 2014), and feeling valued improves motivation (King’s Fund, 2002). In 2016, the Medical and Dental Career Strategy emphasises the need to empower doctors to realise their full potential—for both personal fulfilment and ultimately better patient care.

Benefits of a Career Decision Framework

Despite all our training, career development is rarely taught in medicine. The system expects us to keep climbing the ladder, assuming that as high achievers, we’ll instinctively know what to do next and we do —until we don’t. When challenges arise, from burnout to job dissatisfaction, our confidence takes a hit, making career decisions even harder.

A structured framework provides clarity. It builds self-awareness, confidence, and adaptability, helping us proactively shape our careers rather than reacting to crises. One of the best tools for doctors is the SCAN framework:

• S for Self-Awareness – Understanding your values, interests, strengths, and stressors.

• C for Career Exploration – Researching options, networking, and seeking advice.

• A for Arriving at a Decision – Weighing up options and considering the pros and cons.

• N for Next Steps – Taking action through applications, interviews, and CV building.

Without a structured approach, we often use parts of this process but rarely all of it. SCAN works for all career decisions, big or small and like any skill, it improves with practice.

Self-Awareness is the most overlooked— we tend to look forwards or backwards, but rarely inwards. Yet it’s impossible to make the best career decisions if you don’t truly understand what you need to thrive.

If you would like to find out more about the SCAN approach to career planning, there are excellent modules on 'Career Planning for Healthcare Professionals' on e-learning for Health and the London Careers Unit have some great resources and videos on their website.

Looking Ahead

This is the first in a series of blogs exploring core career planning skills for medics and other healthcare professionals. Over the next few weeks, I’ll be sharing the key resources and strategies I use with the doctors I coach to help them make informed and empowered career decisions.

If you have any questions or comments, I would love to hear from you.