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Looking for a personal development plan template to jumpstart your goals?
In life, you can almost guarantee that you’ll eventually come up against challenges that test how well you can cope.
Having a personal development plan makes you better equipped to handle the pressure in all aspects of your life.
But what exactly is a personal development plan?
This self-improvement tool helps you identify what you need to work on to achieve what you want and face the challenges that life throws your way. What you want could be related to improving the quality of your life, becoming a better version of who you are, or reaching greater heights in your chosen profession or your personal relationships.
Writing down your personal development plan conditions your mind to be receptive to opportunities that help manifest your goals. Neuroscience explains how this works.
In this article, we'll review 11 great personal development plan templates and printables.
First, let's start with a simple definition.
What You Will Learn
- Three Reasons Why You Need a Personal Development Plan
- The Components of a Personal Development Plan
- 11 Best Personal Development Plan Templates and Printables
- 1. Personal Development Plan for Self-Improvement
- 2. Personal Development Plan (Areas of Life)
- 3. PDP Presentation Template
- 4. Simple Excel Template
- 5. 3 Steps to a 5-Year Plan
- 6. Minimalist PDP
- 7. Personal Growth Plan
- 8. Weekly Self-Reflection Worksheet
- 9. Positive Experiences Worksheet
- 10. Wellness Journal
- 11. Becoming a Better You
- Final Thoughts About PDPs
Three Reasons Why You Need a Personal Development Plan
Working on personal development offers the following benefits:
1. Raises self-awareness – Working on your personal development is an opportunity to do some self-evaluation. It calls your attention to the aspects of yourself that need improvement. Through this exercise, you develop a clearer picture of your core values and get in touch with your authentic self. (Check out this core values quizzes to help identify what matters most to you.)
2. Gives you a confidence boost – As you see the positive results of improving yourself, you gain more confidence. And when you work on areas you’ve identified as your weaknesses, you transform them into personal strengths, making you even more confident in your abilities.
3. Strengthens you – As you continue to work on self-improvement, you will naturally work on improving your key strengths. You will learn how to utilize what you’re good at in order to get closer to your goals.
Now, if you're serious about personal development, then check out the Self Planner, which is designed to help you optimize your day, tackle your goals, and live a more fulfilled life.
The Components of a Personal Development Plan
An effective personal development plan follows a certain structure to help you achieve your goals of improving yourself. The process includes:
Below, we’ve rounded up a number of template samples to help you on your journey of self-growth.
11 Best Personal Development Plan Templates and Printables
1. Personal Development Plan for Self-Improvement
If you’re looking for a self-improvement plan template, here’s something we designed to help you reach your goals. Featuring a red, white, and blue color scheme, this template, in landscape orientation, has three major sections where you identify:
Each section has three designated columns for writing down your daily, monthly, and year-end goals relevant to each of the major activities/practices that promote personal development.
2. Personal Development Plan (Areas of Life)
Perhaps you’re working on personal growth in different areas of your life and would like to organize your plans accordingly. If so, this template can help you. We designed it to have spaces where you can write down personal development goals in different areas of your life, such as:
Each box has sufficient space for writing the specific goals you’re working on, as well as additional details. With this template, you can access your self-improvement plans at a glance.
3. PDP Presentation Template
via SketchBubble
This template is specifically designed to help you flesh out your personal development plan.
In this presentation template, you’ll get to know yourself more deeply. You’ll have the opportunity to identify areas in your life that need improvement.
It allows you to pinpoint skills that you currently possess, and that you can utilize to achieve your goals. The slide template also helps you recognize areas where new skills are needed so that you can acquire them accordingly.
This template is available for PowerPoint, Google Slides, and Apple Keynote.
4. Simple Excel Template
Does it feel like you lack direction when it comes to your personal progress? Do you sometimes feel that your efforts are being wasted?
This simple template helps you find the deeper meaning in what you’re doing. It anchors you to what matters most—to the areas that are key to your happiness.
Each person has a unique source of inspiration. In this example, in order for the creator to find personal success, the following aspects need to be addressed:
What drives you to go the extra mile?
5. 3 Steps to a 5-Year Plan
This template was designed to help you identify your five-year plan, as well as your life and daily goals.
The creator of this template pinpointed five categories for your goals: personal, family/social, financial/equity, bucket list, and career.
There is a designated space where you can write your goals in relation to their groupings.
When using this template, you need to write down your life plans first. This part represents your long-term goals.
Dream as big as you can!
Next, the five-year plan contains the baby steps you need to take in order to reach your life goals. This might mean, for example, enrolling in a course that equips you for your dream career.
In goal-setting parlance, the five-year plan is equivalent to your short-term goals. (You might want to check out this post for examples of short-term goals.)
Finally, the daily plan features all the actions you need to do to help you reach your five-year plan.
Want to become conversant in French? Then daily practice is in order. You might want to use an app to help you master a foreign language.
Aspiring to make a major purchase in five years’ time? Tracking your expenses could be the first step toward achieving this goal.
6. Minimalist PDP
If you’re looking for a minimalist template for your personal development plan, you might want to try this one from Myrko Thum.
In this plan, you will be able to identify areas in your life you want to develop. Myrko Thum lists at least seven areas:
There is also a column for the goals you want to achieve, and another for setting deadlines for achieving them.
As with most templates, this one also has a column for success criteria, so you can measure if and when you’ve achieved your goal.
Lastly, a column is assigned for each of your action plans and some notes. This template is unnumbered, so you are free to list as many goals as you want.
7. Personal Growth Plan
Looking for something that helps track all your personal growth goals on a single page?
This template has every detail you need to plot out and track your personal growth. It helps you achieve goals, develop good habits, and maintain a healthy lifestyle.
Best of all, all the information you need is laid out on a single page, such as:
8. Weekly Self-Reflection Worksheet
This worksheet is helpful if you’re working on being mindful of your well-being.
It features self-assessment questions that allow you to get into touch with your emotions and mental health.
The template also has dedicated spaces for keeping track of habits, routines, and activities that promote self-growth and personal development. It is downloadable in A4 size and comes in white, blue, gray, purple, and pink colors.
9. Positive Experiences Worksheet
People sometimes get stuck in negative mental loops. If this becomes a habit, it often leads to low self-esteem and an overall negative outlook on life.
Here’s a worksheet that provides several key words as writing prompts to help people who are stuck in negative thinking. It encourages them to reflect on their actions so they can recognize and affirm positive things they’ve done or experienced in their daily lives.
10. Wellness Journal
With everything that’s happening in our lives and all that’s vying for our attention, it’s challenging to find time for ourselves. This template makes sure that you have time to focus on yourself so you can be recharge and be grounded. That way, you can take on more next time life throws challenges your way.
There are spaces allocated for the following:
At the bottom of the page there is space for you to write your reflections on the day.
11. Becoming a Better You
This template compartmentalizes your personal development goals into pre-set subjects. This makes it easier to focus on specific areas of your life that you want to work on improving.
Some of these areas include:
For every subject, there are spaces allocated for writing up to three goals, as well as the due date and check boxes for when you’ve accomplished each of the goals.
Final Thoughts About PDPs
Having a written plan for your goals, especially those related to personal development, makes it easier to achieve them.
We hope that the personal development plan template samples we featured today will give you focus and inspiration to finally achieve your goal of becoming a better version of yourself.
Meanwhile, for further resources, you might want to check out this post for our book recommendations on the topic of personal development and our top choices for the best personal development podcasts.
Next, if you want to be more productive, overcome decision fatigue, and focus on what matters most, then check out the Self Planner, which is designed to help you optimize your day and live a more fulfilled life.
And, if you’re looking for examples of personal development goals for work and life, this post is worth checking out.
Never stop improving!
Finally, if you want to take your goal-setting efforts to the next level, check out this FREE printable worksheet and a step-by-step process that will help you set effective SMART goals.
