In this modern day of technology, choosing the right career path has become tougher than ever. With new emerging opportunities and trends in career every day, and the technology of yesterday becoming outdated, youngsters are bombarded with tons of options.
There are vivid fields like medical, computer/ software engineer, web development, economics, accounting and finances, liberal arts, film technology, graphics and design, animation, journalism, law, civil services, and many many more.
Most times than not, young people are misguided by traditional myths and bounds on choosing a career. That is for example, career chosen on the basis of current market condition, scope of some field in the near future, or biased decisions of those not well informed of all the possible opportunities.
Well, you have landed in the right place to find answers that suit you best! Without wasting another moment, let us get started.
You Must Avoid These Career Myths!
Myths affect your belief system and at times can drag you down, without you even knowing about it. Hence the first and foremost thing to do is get rid of them. Here are the 8 most common myths that hold hundreds of potential youngsters down. Lets bust ’em!
1. If you don’t decide very early, you will waste a lot of time.
People starting very early miss the essential point of choosing a career, and that is “exploration”. A recent Collegeboard study shows – more than 60% of Harvard graduates have not absolutely sure of what they want to pursue in life. So take your time, you’re definitely not alone in this journey.
2. Once you choose your major, you cannot divert again – changing majors is a waste.
No Amount Of Learning Ever Goes To Waste, It Only Adds To Building Your Skill Set & Intellect
– Shruti Haasan
Changing your major only diversifies your expertise in different fields and levels up the intellect. So feel free to pursue another major as long as you are willing to learn something new.
3. Choosing a career is the same as choosing a major.
Choosing a major does not confine you to working in it. It should rather be seen as a part of the exploration.
4. Most practical way to choose a career is by ensuring employability in it.
This is one of the greatest myths out there. Why would you settle on being employed if there is no real learning experience in it? Once you decide upon what you want to pursue for the next 2 – 3 decades with a whole heart, employability will never be an issue. There is always room in any industry for quality people.
5. Choose your career related to your favorite subject, nothing else.
It sounds obvious to do something you love! But it does not mean that just because you like taking care of others, you will enjoy being a doctor. Involving in a subject as likeness and as a profession are two completely different things.
6. Choosing business as career because business is where all the money lies.
According to BLS, nearly 48% of all new businesses fail to make it to the 5th year of running successfully. And around 86% of those that do make through, do not make grand money for atleast the next 5 years. So just choosing business ensures nothing in specific, especially grand money. And one should not enter the business at all if just money is the motive.
7. Majority of the money lies in STEM careers.
STEM just like any other field, comes with a range of occupations a few are high-paying, but many are low-level and paid poorly. Moreover, all of it depends on your drive and talent, rather than the seemingly correct field.
8. Soft skills are less important than technical skills.
When you want to be successful at work, the key lies in the interaction with others. Not everything that you need to understand in your career will come from a book. Much of what you will learn comes from training, working in groups, supervising others, and experience.
Build Your Career In 7 Easy Steps
1. Envision Your Career Aims
Career selection begins from within. The more truthful you will be to answer certain questions, the clearer the decision will be.
Ask yourself this:
- What do I want to achieve from my career?
- What are my beliefs and ethical values?
- What do I enjoy doing the most, professionally or as a hobby?
- Where do my interests lie?
- What are my strengths and weaknesses? What am I skilled in?
- Would I rather specialize in a specific job or move on to multiple roles?
It’s also important to recall these questions every once in a while. Not only are they good tools for introspection, but also are good self – guiding key questions.
2. Create A Mid Term Plan (8-10 Years)
Establishing milestones for your career on narrowing down your options is necessary. Research the people you idolize, and learn what they did during their tenure of the mid term plan. Decide what achievements you want to have at these future times, and be flexible about them. Then study what you may do to reach these aims. You might need to involve in training programs, take on responsibilities to learn as much as possile about these positions.
By adhering to this plan, you can set sub plans within the entire tenure to track your progress and know how you are heading towards the set goals.
3. Discover Yourself In The Process
Grouped skill sets can describe your personality type. Though there are multiple ways to understand your personality type, the best way is by knowing how you react and respond to certain specific situations. You can then analyse these responses and evaluate them on the basis of your mid term plan or if they match with actions of your own idols. SWOT analysis is one of the best tools for this.
Appear for different personality tests, for which careers are enlisted accordingly. If one or more of them correspond to similar career options, that specific career choice is worth studying further in depth.
A few popular tools to identify your personality type have been listed in the reference section below.
4. Note Down Your Interests
The motive of this step is to take into account what you enjoy and like doing the most. This is also fairly necessary to ensure what you dislike and would probably keep distance from. Say for instance, you may relish majors in software development if you appreciate thinking about how algorithms work, or enjoy a role in journalism if you like traveling and putting forth your views to large audiences.
Once you have gathered all of this information together, you can start looking for relevant work positions and internships. To use this knowledge to your benefit, you can measure how long and good can you sustain in a given industry per se. Now that you are acquainted with that one you are sure to develop your career in, you can take related courses and minor degrees to strengthen your work and knowledge even.
5. Make An Assessment Of Your Skill Sets & Credentials
With all the lists of qualifications, skills and areas of expertise that you have gathered in the last step, narrow down to something specific that you are ready to pursue. Consultation from family, friends, collegues and other close people also helps as it might turn out that they have known you better than yourself.
6. Compare Working Opportunities With Your Qualification
Many internships and jobs have specific credential requirements for new applicants and hires. These credentials may include past experience in the industry, a relevant college degree, or research certificates related to the job position.
While applying to these internships or jobs, make sure you provide the employer with precise information about you, and state all your experience in the field professionally without beating around the bush with irrelevant data.
7. Know Your Financial Needs & Expected Revenue
Streams of income differ greatly from career to career. Find mean job pays and salaries on the basis of job position, field and working hours involved. This can prove to be a great beginning point to know how much you earn in the initial years of work, and how much can the income increase based on the industry and quality of your efforts. This income rises linearly. Once you have build up a good certain amount of revenue to pursue something else like a new venture, or planning systematic investments, you can always branch out from the current job position.
This point is important because it varies from person to person based on his daily responsibilities and ambitions that one seeks to achieve. You can develop a systematic plan considering your pay and how you want to expand from that place on.
Conclusion
Thanks for reading! We hope you enjoyed the article and our mission is accomplished if it helps you in any way. All of the content is supervised by industry experts. Reference links supporting the tips are listed in the “Reference” section below. Do visit for additional info.
References
- https://link.springer.com/content/pdf/10.1007/978-3-319-24612-3_44
- https://psycnet.apa.org/psycinfo/2013-29682-000/
- https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0142694X04000651
- https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/056943450404800204
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Sandeep Bhandari is the founder of PrepMyCareer.com website.
I am a full-time professional blogger, a digital marketer, and a trainer. I love anything related to the Web, and I try to learn new technologies every day.
All the team management, content creation, and monetization tasks are handled by me. Together with the team at PrepMyCareer, the aim is to provide useful and engaging content to our readers.