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How To Discover And Choose The Best Career For YouIt is possible to have a career that you love! And, investing the time and effort to find and choose the best career for you can make the difference between just existing on a day-to-day basis and living a life where you reach your full potential and have fun doing it! There are five key steps to find and choose the best career for you. Each person is a little different so everyone's path through these five steps is different. Take your time. Don't be in a hurry. But do start now. There is no better day than today to find your best future! Make a commitment to yourself that you will do this and that you are worth it!
You've got to know yourselfA lot of people just don't take the time to think about who they really are. Or, what they want. Sometimes we spend a lot of our lives trying to please others. And, that's ok, but to find and choose the best career for you, we need to understand some things about ourselves.There's a lot we could go into here but here's the three most important questions to answer about yourself. 1) What are you passionate about? Really. What do you love to do? What things will get you excited at the drop of a hat? What do you really care about? 2) What are your natural talents? Things you do well. Things that come easy to you. Your strengths. 3) What is your personality type? It's important to know about your personality because some careers just may not fit who you are even though they may seem attractive at first. For example: Do you like to be alone or do you enjoy being around people? A little bit of both, perhaps? Do you share about yourself easily with others or like to keep those details to yourself? Are you easygoing and carefree or do you need to be on a schedule? There are lots of ways to find the answers to these questions. There are tons of books out there on this subject and probably lots of web sites, too. Your local library is a great place to start looking for information on matching your interests with career possibilities. But, you can start to work on the first two questions by just sitting down and starting a list. Then, go ask three or four other people you are close to (parents are an excellent source of this kind of information, friends are good, people you work with, too) the same two questions. What do they think you are passionate about? What do they think are your natural talents? Finding out about your personality will take some research on your part. If you can't get professional assistance with it, you can at least get an idea about your preferences about certain things and use that. (Look for books about identifying your personality type - I recommend some at the link below).
Discover what you really want out of a careerTo find and choose the best career for you it's imperative to ponder the most important thing your career has to provide for you.Is it money? Security? How important is it that your work complment your personal value system? Will it be just a means to an end or will your work need to be a statement about who you are? There are no right answers to any of these types of questions. Just your answers. About your future. What you really want out of your career. And, what your work needs to feel like to you. That's right. It needs to feel right. I know that sounds a little funny. But, it's true. It comes down to matching work with your values. What you are willing or not willing to sacrifice for a career. It's also about nailing down the actual type of work environment that gels with your lifestyle. A 9 to 5 job? Always in a suit? Need lots of time outdoors? Want to be work as part of team? Stuff like that. Then, you need to...
Explore Career Options That May Fit YouAfter identifying what you do well, who you are, and what you want it's time to start digging for options that may work for you. You do have to find and explore various career options in order to choose the best one for you!There are lots of places you can go for all kinds of information to help you learn about different careers. This will take some time. But, just like studying for a big test, the more time you invest doing your homework, the better you'll do! I think the Occupational Information Network offered by the U.S. Department of Labor is a tremendous resource that is pretty easy to use.
Prioritize your options and choose your best fit careerThe fourth key step to find and choose the best career for you is to act on what you've learned!A lot of people forget this critical step. They just do lots and lots of research and then don't act. You do have to choose the best career for you. No one else can do that. Yes, that's hard. The good news that you always have a choice. And, you should choose what you think is best for YOU! So, how to choose. The first thing I'd recommend is to try to narrow it down to three career options rather than only falling in love with one. It's always good to have options! Second, I'd talk to at least 3 people that currently work in each area you are considering and ask them what they like and don't like about it. I'd also ask them how they got into that career and any recommendations they might have for you to get started. Third, prioritize your options. Which one seems the best fit for you? Why? What are the pros and cons of each? Ultimately, you need to put them in order and then move on to the final step. Which is..
Make an action plan!It's important to figure out the steps you need to take to get from where you are right now to actually working at your best fit career. This is really important! Not taking the time to identify the necessary steps and then not making a plan to achieve them is what keeps a lot of dreams from becoming reality.And, any dream can become reality with a good plan and a commitment to work the plan! How do you do that? The best way I know is to view it as a journey and then break down the journey into identifiable steps. Kind of like the directions MapQuest gives you. First you turn right and go 1.3 miles to XYZ Drive, then turn left onto Exciting Road and go 2.7 miles, etc., etc, until you reach your destination. That's all a good plan is. A map that gives you the directions to get where you want to go. In this case, step by step directions to the career of your dreams! The destinations of your journey will depend on where you are right now and what you need to do get to your chosen career. You'll need to figure out if you need to acquire any new skills or body of knowledge. Where can you learn them? At what cost? Where can you fit the time to begin your transition? What sacrifices will you have to make? What are you willing to give up to make this happen? Who can help you? If you don't know anyone off the top of your head, who do you know that might know someone that can help you? All these "destinations" can be mapped out. Don't worry if your list is long. At the very least, you will now have a plan. And, as you go through the plan, it's ok to change the plan as you learn new or better ways to improve the plan. The key is write it down. Make a commitment to yourself to work the plan. Then get to work. You are worth it!
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