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How To Pick The Right Career Path?

 

How to choose a right career after 12th or graduation

The journey of a student starts from the 11th standard when our education system allows them to choose any one stream from the 3 conventional streams (Science, Commerce, Humanities).

As per the New Education Policy 2021, a student is allowed to choose his stream in the 9th standard. This will give a child more time to understand and learn the basics of that subject which will build a strong foundation for them.

How a child can decide about their career in 9th standard if they don’t have any idea what career options are available for them, which career path they pursue in the future and which one is best for them. What will be the demand of the market till they completed their graduation?

I had observed many parents and students in the dilemma of choosing the right stream or subjects which they can continue till graduation. Till now we are using the hit and trial method to find the right career path.

Is there any proven method to decide which career path is right for us? Yes.

There are some steps if you follow them you can pick the right career path for you.

Here we have 7 steps of self-analysis assessment for choosing the right career path.

1. Self-Assessment (Understand yourself first)

In our school or college, we are mostly influenced by our friends, successful siblings, and sometimes by our seniors also. But we are not sure about our originality. The first thing you need to ask yourself is who you are? What you’re good at what you enjoy the most?

We are afraid of asking these questions to ourselves due to peer pressure or family pressure. Or maybe we don’t know the right technique to find answers to these questions.

Here are some useful questions you can ask yourself.

  • Which subject did I enjoy the most in school?
  • Which activity did I love to participate in academics or beyond?
  • What are my good and bad characteristics?
  • What are the career options available in the future if I choose this particular subject?
  • How much time and effort it will take to excel in it?
  • Can I devote that amount of time without getting bored?
  • Do I love this subject or I’m just influenced by some other factors?

All you need is paper and pen and a willingness to write honest answers to all the questions. 

This exercise will help you in identifying your true potential and interest. You can also use free self-assessment tests and career tools available online to know more about your traits and behavior.

2. Make a list of career options you want to explore

At this point, there can be two scenarios:

First is, you have some career options in your mind and you want to explore them more.

The second is, you are clueless and have no idea about any career option.

If you belong to the first category and you have your list of career options, keep it organized and choose the top 5 career options for you. Research a little bit more about them and find out the basic characteristics of the same.

For instance, you are a creative and fun-loving person, who loves to socialize with people, and the career option you want to choose is monotonous, requires more attention and time for practice. So that combination may not the best fit for you. Because it contradicts your characteristics. So careful assessment of your traits and required skills for the career option you want to pursue is necessary.

If you belong to the second category, and you didn’t have any list of career options then try to find out that career options which match your traits. Where you can utilize your natural skills and abilities and pursue them in the future by enhancing the skills you have.

3. Find the basic requirements of your top 5 career options

Every career has its requirements and required skill sets. Before you decide about any career find out the basic requirements of that career. If the requirements of that career matched with your skill sets then only you will enjoy it in a long run and grow gradually in it.

If you choose a career that is opposite of your natural characteristics or skillset, then it will be difficult for you to grow further in your career. At some point, you feel stuck or frustrated and try to find out other options or attempt to change your domain; which is very difficult after a particular period.

If we take an example of a career in teaching, basic skill sets required for that are patience, subject matter expert, human behavioral knowledge, teaching ability, understanding of child psychology, socialize nature.

If your real behavior is above 60% similar to the basic requirements of teaching, then only you can enjoy the teaching profession in the long run. Otherwise, you feel stuck or less motivated and don’t took interest in sharing your knowledge deeply with students.

Which harmful for you and students too. Likewise, every profession has its basic characteristics try to find those to choose the right career for you.

Self assessment tool for right career choice

4. Know the difference between hobby and passion

There is a saying by my mentor “Passion brings money in your pocket and hobby takes money out from your pocket.”

It is important to identify whether you are influenced by your passion or hobby to choose your career.

Suppose you love to do the painting in your free time and you are looking for establishing your career as an artist.

Ask some questions to yourself before you derive to any conclusion:

  • Can I do painting 24x7 without feeling bored?
  • Can I be able to continue it lifelong whether I earn money from it or not?
  • Do I passionate to learn different art forms and minute details about painting?
  • Do I have that artistic perspective that encouraged me to see the creative side of everything?

If your answer is Yes, then there are chances you are passionate about painting is not just a hobby for you. But if the answers are No, then you need to think about other career options.

Never take your decisions in a hurry when it is about your career path. Take your time, talk to different people, take the help of professionals, research on the internet, and try to talk to yourself to bring the best out of yourself.

difference between hobby and passion for right career choice

5. Identify how long you can pursue it

As we discussed earlier, it is necessary to identify how long you can pursue your selected career.

Here you need to think about the future scope of your selected career. In history, we have shreds of evidence that a particular career took boom for 3-4 years and due to the abundance of people in that career, it loses its dignity.

From 2008 to 2013, B.tech is so popular among the students that everyone is fascinated by it. Suddenly demand for B.tech colleges rises. And the focus of colleges shifted from quality to quantity. Consequently, we have B.tech graduates which are unemployable. They have a degree but not appropriate skills and knowledge.

So it important to consider the future of your opted course and demand in the market for it.

If you can upskill yourself according to the demands of the market and cope up with every situation then you can design your career path by your will.

6. Future possibilities of that career

As we just discussed, it is important to consider the nature and future scope of a career while choosing it.

Now the question arises, how to check future possibilities of any career?

If we talk about the current scenario, in COVID-19 the demand for online services increased suddenly. Whether it is online marketing, online classes, or online working. And if you take a sneak peek at the past 10 years there are various emerging careers are available nowadays which have never been heard or not so popular even 5 years ago.

Robotics, Machine learning, Digital Marketing Data Science, Data Analytics, Neuro-linguistic Programming, Software Development are some examples of the professions which are growing rapidly and shift to the next level in the future.

Always think about the next 10-15 years while deciding on your career. And most important, the characteristics of that career should match with your own.

If the career you choose similar to your basic nature you feel at ease in learning advancements in it, the ups and downs of market demand hardly bother you. When you are determined and passionate about your work you are ready to manage everything easily.

7. Take a final decision

Now it's time to take the final decision about your career. All the steps we have discussed till now will help in finding your goal in life and help you in deciding the right career path for you.

Once you are clear with the goal and career path to achieve that goal now you can focus on the learning process to accomplish the goal you have set.


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Location: India

Comments

  1. Unknown16 June 2021 at 21:33

    very informative and helpful article, great thoughts!!

    ReplyDelete

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