How to Choose a Career
Almost everyone has asked at least once in their lives about how to choose a career. Many who are nearing the crossroads of their lives have pondered the age old question of what career is right for me. For some, this might seem like quite an insurmountable task while others just go gung ho and dive into whatever is laid before them.
However, those who wise up and sit down to weigh things over do get the best out of their chosen careers. After all, no one wants to climb a ladder only to find out they have laid it against the wrong wall. Choosing the right career is indeed more of a process rather than a one time thing that changes your trajectory in an instant.
The Power of Self Assessment
One of the pivotal things one will ever do with their lives is not just picking the career they would entrench their lives on. Even before one immerses in a chosen profession, one must first assess themselves. A lot of things come into play when it comes to career choice. Some of the factors people take into consideration include their skills, interests, and values, along with their very own personal traits.
Getting Help
One of the important tools on how to choose a career is to get the assistance of a career counselor. There are career development professionals who help individuals with self assessment and evaluate the various factors that play in one’s career choice.
Sometimes acquiring the services of a career development facilitator isn’t financially feasible. Finances can sometimes become an issue for others but this should not become a hindrance when it comes to finding out what career is right for me. Of course, there are alternatives other than hiring the services of a professional career development specialist.
In such situations, one can go to the local public library since some of these institutions offer some form of career planning help. Students may also check with their universities and colleges since they also have career development offices that may be of assistance. Other than these, there are online career assessment tools that are available for free on the Internet. There are a lot of free tools to help figure out what career is right for me.
Working with the List
The end product on all the above effort on how to choose a career is a list of possible careers that one can opt for. This list of possible fields of endeavor is the result of the process of self assessment, which is basically the fruit of one’s own labor plus help from a guide.
This will then lead to the next step to find out which career is most suitable for the said candidate. In reality, one can’t do all the stuff on the said list. The next step therefore is to gather information about every possible career on the list. One of the first bits of information that people usually gather will be a job description for each item on the list.
Other than that, one should also pull up information on that particular career’s outlook. One should check out whether the said career will still be in demand in the next five to ten years at least. The required education and training should also come up. These are but some of the things one must do on how to choose a career.
