Career Planning Step 2 - Target the Market

This post is the third of a six-part series dedicated to career planning.  In my first post I outlined the five steps of the career planning process.  I then followed up discussing step 1 and the self reflection required to define who your are and your personal brand promise.  This post will focus on step 2 and the strategic framework to properly assess the market and target a defined market.  Would you be able to answer someone if they asked you what market are you in and why?

This step is critical as it defines the strategic direction of your career and sets you down a path that you must be completely conscious of its implications.  There is nothing more distressful than to get to a destination a few years down the road and come to the conclusion that the market for your services is a commodity, declining or for external trends to negatively impact your success.  The marketplace for your service is constantly changing so evaluating the external market and it's forces will ensure your career plan accounts for these dynamics.

I have found it useful to apply many of the marketing and competitive strategy concepts that I learned in business school to career planning. At the end of the day your competitive advantage will depend on how well you know the way to compete, the knowledge and skills required, where to compete, and whom you compete against.  You must analyze the market opportunities for the brand promise you defined in step 1 and then differentiate the offering in a target market.  Although this sounds very straightforward there are many aspects to this "career strategy".  

Questions that you must answer to establish a career strategy that is guided by your personal brand profile:

Customer Analysis:

1. Who is the customer for your services? How would you segment the customer? Who are the biggest, most profitable or most attractive potential customers?
2. Customer motivation - What attributes of the offering do customers value most?  What are they "really" buying? What is the compelling reason to buy?
3. Unmet needs - Why are customers not satisfied and what are the unmet needs? Do you think you can deliver on these?

Market Analysis:

1. Market Size - How big is the market opportunity?
2. Market Growth - Is the market for your offering growing or shrinking?
3. Market Trends - What are the trends that are or will be shaping this market?
4. Profitability Projection - What is the estimated profitability for your services based on industry structure?  Using Michael Porter's 5 Forces Model: How intense is competition? What are the threat of substitutes? What is the threat of potential new entrants? What is the bargaining power of your target customers or suppliers?
5. Critical Success Factors - What are the skills and knowledge required to compete in this market?

I would recommend you leverage market research to ground your market analysis using a data driven approach.

Environmental Analysis:

1. What are the external trends or events that could impact your career strategy?  Factors can include technology, economics, government policies, emerging lifestyle trends, changing demographics, etc.
2. How would you identify or forecast future trends or events?

Core Competence:

1. What is your unique combination of skills that will create a competitive advantage in the target market you have chosen for your career?
2. How sustainable is this core competence? How will you protect it?
3. How will you differentiate your offering?

Adjacent Target Markets:

1. Using Geoffrey Moore’s “bowling alley” strategy to first gain leadership in a niche market with a particular pain point and then tackle a series of adjacent markets (“pins”), what are the opportunities to grow your services in adjacent related markets?
2. What order would you proceed in to target these markets?
3. How difficult will it be to become credible in these related markets?

The deliverable from this step is a clear target market for your service and the core competence that will be a basis for profiting in the market.  After documenting your career strategy you should ultimately be able to quickly tell a person what market you are in, why this market, and what makes your value sustainable over time.  I found this career strategy step to be the most difficult, but I would recommend you approach this exercise with free, creative thinking to explore career options that exploit your personal brand profile and may have otherwise been missed.