Career is a life choice. It shapes your identity and gives you independence and self-confidence. It's not possible to reverse time and money spent over years into pursuing an education option. Hence, we need to be very sure while choosing a career path.
Five tips are listed below which can help you make smart career choice in choosing your career option:
# Tip 1: Know your Interest & Aptitude: It is important that we should not only explore various career options but also explore our own interest, aptitude, strengths and weaknesses. Self-awareness leads to a smarter career choice and hard work all the way appears easy. There are several ways to know about your interest & aptitude.
One of the popular and reliable method is taking psychometric career tests which gives indicative career profile. This method is widely used in developed countries to start with career exploration process.
# Tip 2: Have a Career Diary: Keep a career diary with yourself, write down all the career options which appeals to you. Write down all questions related to it. Write down what your expectation is from your dream career. Writing will help you clearly see through your career goals and ask all right questions about it. It will prepare you for your dream career. Make this a habit.
# Tip 3: Research on eligibility criteria: Every career option has an eligibility criteria attached. Age limit, education qualification, subject requirements, physical attributes like vision, height, weight etc. are part of eligibility criteria. To get into your chosen career option, fulfilling these criteria is very important.
For example, to be an air-hostess generally, female flight attendants need to be at least 5 feet 3 inches to 6 feet 3 inches in height and weigh 58-70kg. Male flight attendants need to be 5 feet 7 inches to 6 feet 3 inches in height and weigh 68-82kg.If you do not fall into these criteria you cannot become an air-hostess or flight attendant. Learn about these criteria before choosing your dream career option.
# Tip 4: Know about 'A Day in the life of ': Many a times we end up being fascinated by the portrayal of a career based on what we see on television and in movies but that necessarily need not be the true portrayal of what will be expected to do on the job. It's important that you research, ask and collect information about what 'a day in the life of' a particular career option will be, just don't ask for how much salary you can earn in a particular career option but find out how many hours you will be expected to work for, what kind of work you will be doing, what kind of people you will be dealing with etc.
# Tip 5: Ask a Career Counsellor: We do look for movie reviews when we are planning to watch it or check out ratings and reviews of a new restaurant we are about to dine in, then why do we fail to find out from a career counsellor and talk about our option and seek opinions from them. After all, choosing a career option is a high involvement decision. Regular professional advice will prepare you better for the future and you will be able to take a much more informed decision.