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How to Choose Your Career

  1. Choose your industry

What should you do when you start to choose your career? Which industry should you choose? This is a million-dollar question. Many highly successful people have actually fallen into a field by chance. However, given the technology available currently, it is much easier to analyze the different available fields and choose your dream career.

  • Which careers are growing?
    • Career Databases such as onet.com have a list of all industries with growth rate and average salary
    • Google search “fastest growing careers”
  • Which careers are you passionate about?
    • Which courses did you enjoy most at school?
    • What did you enjoy doing most at your last job?
  • Which careers closely relate to your previous experience?
    • What skills do job postings in different careers require?
    • What transferable skills do you possess that can be used in those jobs?
  • Which careers do your family and friends work in?
    • These are industries in which you have one foot in the door.

Come up with a list of careers, and sort them by level of interest.

  1. What are the essential skills?

  • Search for the ten jobs in the careers you are most interested in using Monster, LinkedIn and CareerBuilder. These jobs must interest you.
  • Make a list of skills that you need for these jobs. Also include number of years of experience
  • In this list, decide which skills you possess.
  • Using b and c, fill the Skills Matrix chart.

Skills Matrix 300x193 - How to Choose Your Career

  1. What skills do you have?

  • Make a list of “I Have Skills”.

    • These are ones you should emphasize in your resume and portfolio.
    • Make a list of interview stories for these experiences using “STAR” format.

  1. What skills do you need to train for?

Also come up with a list of “I need Skills”.

  • This will form the basis of your training plan.
  • If the Skill is a degree such as “Bachelor of Science in Engineering”, then you do need to look at getting a degree in the field.
  • If the Skill requires a certain number of years of experience, you can look at training yourself online. There are a few ways in which you can gain experience which can be of interest to employers:
    • Do a few pet projects that demonstrate your expertise and document them clearly. Be able to explain them in “STAR” interview format.
    • Apply to internships in your area of expertise.
    • Volunteer your skills to employers in your industry that interest you.

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