Includes bibliographical references.

chapter 1 Introduction: A Guide for the Idealist’s Path -- part Part I: Launching -- chapter 2 Am I Good Enough? -- chapter 3 Making Choices -- chapter 4 What Is My Work? -- chapter 5 What Work Setting? -- chapter 6 Career Plans Are Useless -- part Part II: Succeeding -- chapter 7 Principled Adaptability -- chapter 8 Being Right -- chapter 9 Avoiding Wrong -- chapter 10 Navigating Managers, Organizations, and Teams -- chapter 11 Working With Mentors -- chapter 12 Conclusion: Your Idealist Story.

A Guide for the Idealist is a must for young professionals seeking to put their idealism to work. Speaking to urban and regional planners and those in related fields, the book provides tools for the reader to make good choices, practice effectively, and find meaning in planning work. Built around concepts of idealism and realism, the book takes on the gap between the expectations and the constraints of practice. How to make an impact? How to decide when to compromise and when to fight for a core value?. The book provides processes for "launching" planning careers, include addressing doubt, decision-making, and assessing types of work and work settings. Then it explains principled adaptability as professional style. Subsequent chapters address career planning, being right, avoiding wrong, navigating managers, organizations and teams, working with mentors, and understanding the career journey. Underpinning these dimensions is a call for planners to reflect on what they are doing as they are doing it. The advice provided is based on the experience of a planning professor who has also practiced planning throughout his career. The book includes personal anecdotes from the author and other planners about how they launched and managed their careers.