Facts to Help You Build a Strong Career on the Right Foundation

Career building exercise. Photo courtesy of Shutterstock.

Life in the 21st century has been reduced to an endless struggle in pursuit of success, prosperity, happiness and contentment. However, to facilitate your search for the above, you must build a strong foundation for your career. Today, career-building is one of the most important individual attributes which can set you on the road to success. Before jumping into a course or a career, it is extremely important for you to understand the extent and the effectiveness of your decision in propelling you towards your goals. Here are some interesting facts to guide you:

• The key to building a strong career is researching and understanding the full scope of what you want to do, understanding what you have to do to bring your dreams to fruition, analyzing whether you have it in you to do the same, and making wise decisions.
• Never be ashamed or afraid to do what you love. While jobs in medicine, engineering or other industries definitely have an advantage, there are several non-conventional career options which you can follow. From cosmetology, criminology, speech training and optometry to firefighting, filmmaking, auctioneering and accountancy, no matter how obtuse the angle, there will most definitely be a course and a job opening for you, provided you look hard enough.
• Most employers care more about your competence and aptitude than your qualification. Conventional streams of thought dictate that if you do not possess enough qualifications or a master’s degree from a renowned institution, you have no chance of getting into a decent career. However, these norms stand for very less today, and you can not only apply for, but also pursue a career in any field, no matter what your major is. Most firms believe in building experience rather than stressing on academic background.
• It is very important to have a set impression and a clear view of what direction you want to go to after passing out of high school or college. This way, you will be able to analyze which courses and majors are perfect for you and which institutions offer the same.
• If you are not able to pursue your dream job even after getting your major, do not despair, as your major is not a one-trick pony directed only at that particular job. A student with a major in computer science could opt for careers in teaching, software development, information security, cyber investigation and several other options, while another student with a major in journalism can pursue not only journalism, but also scriptwriting, freelance content writing, marketing, public relations and even business administration. Do not confine yourself to one particular goal, as there is a world of opportunities out there.
• There are many different ways to approach the same job. For example, you do not need to go straight for a major in journalism to become a journalist, as an English major and a communications major are deemed equally qualified for the same. An English major can also provide a host of options other than writing, like proofreading, speechwriting, translation/interpretation, teaching, publishing, and politics, legal and paralegal as well.
• It is important to fully commit yourself to whatever you do, and ensure that every assignment is a new challenge for you, from which you gain experience. You must plan your tasks carefully, do as much research as you can and then put them into effect.
• A very important thing you must keep in mind is, while you may have grown accustomed to the workplace, lifestyle and your colleagues in a particular firm, you might not be working to your full productivity due to loss of interest. In such situations, sometimes it is prudent to move on to another job, which will prove to be more interesting and provide new challenges. Statistics indicate that the average professional changes his occupation 6 to 8 times over the course of his lifetime to keep productivity up and lay the foundation for what can be regarded as a robust, strong career.
• While some employers like to hire straight out of college, most would prefer that you have some experience in the job and are able to bring a lot more to the workplace than just fresh ideas.

Author: Jack is a well-known career counsellor who has been in the business for over two decades. Having fully understood both student psyche as well as the various steps needed to build a solid career which lives up to one’s dreams, he is now sharing his ideas through his blog.