Check out this listing of the “Best Careers 2008.” This kind of stuff is great for career research! Of course the danger here is that this list is developed using someone else’s value system, or at least values that are presumed to be important to most people. But if you go into the article realizing that, you should be okay.
Also, keep in mind that what really make a career one of “the best” is how well it suits the individual. For example, just because audiologist is listed doesn’t mean everyone will be happy doing it of course!
But this article does get you thinking about trends and changes as well as profiling a few select careers so it is worth a looksy. I especially like the section on “Most Overrated” because we all have stereotypical ideas of what certain careers are like and so it’s good to get the rest of the story. Of course it would be even better to talk to someone in person yourself if you are seriously considering one of these careers.
There is not an OSFA (one size fits all) for career assessments. Generally, though, there are some important data sets that a person can consider when taking stock of career options – personality type, interests, skills, and values.
- For personality type, I recommend the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI). You can find a list of providers of the assessment here. There are some great books and free resources on the net too. Here is one option (scroll down).
- For interests, I recommend the Strong Interest Inventory. See the list of providers above many who also give this assessment. Here is a quick version you can check out free online (click on the column headings in white).
- For skills assessment, I like to reference the O*Net Skills Search checklist which is free online. Here is another good free one online.
- For values, here is a very good free resource.
How long would it take you to gather up all the information you need to fill out a complete professional history for a job or school application? Would you be able to get your hands on all the data you’d need? Despite the best of intentions and filing efforts, most people struggle to pull together their career and educational histories.
If you’ve ever scrambled to find papers and wracked your brain to piece together dates you’ve held jobs or received educational certifications, then you know what a headache it is to have disorganized professional records.
If you’ve ever agonized over writing a resume because you can’t remember what you accomplished in past positions, then you know the feeling of missing – or almost missing – a deadline to apply for a position.
Or, if you’ve ever not gotten the raise or promotion you were hoping for because you didn’t have your thoughts put together well enough to build your case, then you know firsthand that disorganization can lead to missed opportunities.
Weekly career tracking is important for several reasons.
- Investing the time to do it now and as you go along will save you time in the long run.
- Details are much easier to record while fresh in your mind rather than having to hunt for them later.
- Knowing the specifics and being able to speak confidently about them will help your confidence and credibility when applying, networking, and interviewing.
- If you ever get stuck in a career rut where you don’t know what to do next, you can get ideas by easily taking an inventory of what you have done previously.
- Someday you might need a school or college transcript to apply for a job or educational opportunity, and now you will have the details of how to do it at your fingertips.
- Tracking attendance to conferences and membership in professional associations will ensure you get the most benefit for your time and money spent.
If you haven’t kept up with these details so far, then you’ll have a good bit of extra work to get started, but once you’ve established a baseline record, keeping it up to date will be a piece of cake.
When you take ownership of your career materials and records, you take ownership of your career direction. Career tracking is meant to help you secure the most satisfying, rewarding, and—if you desire—money-making opportunities at any moment in time.
It may seem counterintuitive, but the best way to find a job is be able to tell people exactly what kind of job you are seeking. Sometimes people think it is best to keep all options open for any type of job that may come along. But with that strategy there is a higher likelihood that they will not like the position they accept and will be looking for a job again real soon because they quit or got fired. A person who handles the job search that way risks quickly becoming a job hopper. And guess what, it all started because they didn’t define what they were looking for in the first place.
The process does not have to be difficult or long and drawn out. It can be quite enriching if a person takes the time, but it can be done quickly with a few educated guesses when food just needs to get to the table too.
Minimally, you need to know:
- What kind of work fits your lifestyle right now such as part time, full time or contract?
- What industry are you interested in?
- What are example job titles?
- What skills you have to offer and what kind of problems you can solve with those skills?
With this kind of information in mind you can start the job search by asking people you know and people you meet a very powerful question, “Who do you know in the retail clothing industry that may be looking for part-time employees?” As simple as that you can begin accessing the hidden job market and the power of networking.
Thinking about past experiences in school as a child and teen is an often recommended exercise that can help you recognize where you are naturally skilled and activities you enjoy. You have to be careful and thoughtful in the interpretation though. For example, I used to love to ride my horse as a preteen. In looking back later during a career reflection, it would be easy to me to take off on a tangent about how to involve horses in my career. If I imagined taking some kind of route like that, I would realize that it just doesn’t feel right to me. I’m not that interested in horses! So after more self reflection I was surprised to realize that it was more about the sense of freedom and independence I got from horse riding. There was also a bit of risk-taking involved as well as a camaraderie that I enjoyed building with the horse that really drew me to the activity. Now, I can see now how this past joyful experience plays into my career choice of being an infopreneur.
I wrote before about how being a careerillionaire is not necessarily about the money. Take a look at this little sketch depicting “The Evolution of Work-Life Balance.” Very clever! The prediction is that by 2050 we will get to life.
Here is the thing about careerillionaires — they don’t wait. They are working with passion now so work feeds their spirits and doesn’t feel like work. One reason for this is that careerillionaires make their quality of life top priority!
Yesterday something happened to me that happens all the time. I met a new person and she happened to be looking for a job. I asked her what kind of job she was looking for and she curled her lip, shrugged her shoulders and said, “anything really.”
Okay, I’ll admit this is a pet peeve for me. Here she is looking for a job and any job will do. Do you believe that? Yeah, me neither. I’m sure anybody she’s networking with feels like they have to do a lot of work to learn anything about her and her skills and ambition. My guess is her cover letters and resumes and any applications that she is putting out there are very nonspecific too. This is likely the main reason that her job search has gone on nine months so far with no offers which is certainly a source of frustration for this bright, young woman.
Of course I can’t resist talking to anyone about their career. So I asked a few more questions and found out that she was a burned out elementary school teacher who had been teaching for three years. She felt like she was a statistic because she had heard reports that so many new teachers only last three to five years in the field. I told her that might be true but most people these days are only in any job for three to five years before being let go or otherwise choosing to move on anyway. I also tried to reassure her that sometimes you don’t know if you will like a profession until you’re in it but you can always learn something from it.
As we continued to visit, finally her eyes lit up about something. What she really wanted was to start her own business! She had already done a lot of research into potential businesses and was continually drawn to ideas centered on working with children. She also wanted to continue to use her curriculum development and organizational skills. Now we were onto something! Better yet her education and time teaching would nicely support such a business endeavor which was really important to her.
So by the end of the conversation she had a new person in her personal network. I was also able to provide her with several resources to check out. We also had an impromptu brainstorming session which resulted in several business concepts that she is excited to research further.
Moral of the story: knowing what you want sure helps other people help you…even people you just met.
It all begins by knowing yourself. That is not to say that you will choose one career for life, no, it is an ever evolving process of making more and better distinctions of who you are and what you want to accomplish in your lifetime. It is about, learning, researching, and talking a little everyday about potential and opportunity. It is not in obsessive thing though. It is more about going with the flow in a productive manner yet always honoring when you are right now in the process.
In a previous post I talked about Robert Allen’s definition of an infopreneur. This month one of my favorite organizations, The World Future Society, has a very good article titled The 21st Century Writer. Fascinating stuff and another way of further defining the career option called infopreneur although they don’t use the term infopreneur in the article.
Reading this article reminds me that the key to cutting edge infopreneuring is taking advantage of the newest technology and knowing how to mix the media to provide people with the information they want the way they want it. Maybe that is text, blogging, audio, video, slides, some sort of mixture…who knows? The point is the possibilities are endless for creative, tech savvy infopreneurs!
Check out this listing of the “Best Careers 2008.” This kind of stuff is great for career research! Of course the danger here is that this list is developed using someone else’s value system, or at least values that are presumed to be important to most people. But if you go into the article realizing that, you should be okay.