
Career Check-Up: Professional Development as a Wellness Tool
Presentation Description: Law enforcement professionals need career and professional development now more than ever. Given the climate, the recruiting and retention crisis, and the evolving landscape of expectations, professional growth and career development have taken a back seat. In this session, we will cover the foundational concepts of career planning and professional development. Using the strategic career model, participants will be able to identify skills, plan for their future, and ask themselves important questions in their own career journey and can address the significant health and wellness issues police agencies face today. Participants will leave with a strategic career framework and significant resources to support their journey.
Methodology: This is an interactive single-speaker presentation. Career development is an important way to enhance employee engagement, increase recruitment and retention, provide career paths for sworn and civilian staff, support professional wellness, and ensure that everyone in the agency has the skills necessary to create value in community safety. At the conclusion, the participants will leave with resources and a framework they can apply immediately upon return to their agency. Empowering officers and civilians to take ownership of their career improves organizational and personal wellness. This session was built primarily through personal experience of the presenter, and supported by evidence-based research from leadership, management, and career development academic studies.
- 1. Increase and enhance your ability to make self-directed professional development plans (known as individual development plans);
- 2. Foster a strategic view toward life-long learning and development through devising a career planning strategy;
- 3. Enable professional skill development for present and future success through reflection, awareness, planning, and revision.

Colin May
Senior Advisor
U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), Office of Inspector General (OIG), Office of Investigation
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