In the development of young professionals, choosing a career can prove to be a stressful time. Not only are there potential societal pressures, there could be family pressures and expectations, and you may just not know enough about what is out there to confidently choose. The most important thing to do is to take a deep breath and be true to your passions. This small yet poignant collection of tips will help you to de-clutter your thoughts on what your career should be and will point you in the direction of what you want your career to do for you. Decoding all of these thoughts will leave you with the confidence to choose your career and bring you the success you dream of.
Introduce yourself to yourself
Any full-time job requires roughly 40 hours a week, but many know that 40 hours can quickly turn to 60 depending on your career. That’s nearly half of the hours in any given week that are being utilized for work. Anything you’ll be spending that amount of time on has to be something that you care about and are passionate about. This requires you to really know yourself. Take the time to look inward at what really motivates you, and look at the possibilities that are out there to find a match. There are plenty of online resources available to help you answers those tough questions.
Choose your focus
According to the Harvard Business Review, there are two different focuses that a person should consider when choosing a career; prevention-based focuses, and promotion-based focuses. Promotion and prevention are two mentalities that everyone uses as fuel to motivate them, but finding which one drives you more will help you to see which careers work best for your end-goal. If you are promotion-focused, you’ll likely excel in abstract thinking, creativity and innovation, and embracing risk, whereas prevention-focused people are extremely detail-oriented, analytical, and work with a high level of accuracy. Match these strengths and skills to different industry requirements, and you’ll have a greater sense of what career will work with you the best.
Don’t let fear scare you
One crucial element of choosing your career is to not let fear stand in your way. Making big life decisions can be overwhelming and intimidating, but just remember that the reward will always pay off if you have the right focus and are staying true to your wants and needs. While it’s important to focus on the end-goal, you will learn so much about yourself along the way that your passions could change before you achieve what you once dreamed of- this is okay! Enjoy the journey and try not to let the fear of the unknown hold you back.
For more tips on how to choose your career, please stay tuned to my blog, which you can access here.