Identify Your Career Options
Develop a refined list of career options by examining your interests, skills, and values through self-assessment and narrowing your career options by reviewing career information, talking to professionals in the field, or actual experiences such as shadowing, volunteering, and internships.
Prioritize the Choices
Prioritize your essential criteria, listing desired interests, skills and values in priority order. Clarify that list further by rank ordering the criteria or by creating a rating scale. Be sure to use the same system for all of your criteria.
Make Comparisons
Compare your most promising career options against each of your prioritized criteria. Evaluate how strongly the option might express a particular criterion. Want to do a more in-depth analysis? Fill in and save this handy career comparison worksheet.
You should now have your prioritized career choices. With Myplan, an online career planning system, you may prioritize and save your options.
Other factors?
You should consider factors beyond personal preferences. What is the current demand for this field? If the demand is low or entry is difficult, are you comfortable with risk? What qualifications are required to enter the field? Will it require additional education or training? How will selecting this option affect you and others in your life? Gather advice from friends, colleagues and family members. Consider potential outcomes and barriers for each of your final options.
Make a Choice
Choose the career paths that are best for you. How many paths you choose depends upon your situation and comfort level. If you’re early in your planning, then identifying multiple options may be best. You may want several paths to hedge your bets. Conversely, narrowing to one or two options may better focus your job search or graduate school application.
Next Steps
Now that you’ve identified your career options, develop an action plan to implement this decision. Identify specific, time-bound goals and steps to accomplish your plan.
Career Development Specialists Can Help
Career Development Specialists are at GECD-Career Services to help you make effective career decisions. Make an appointment on Careerbridge to talk to a Career Specialist about your career options and concerns.
Source by https://gecd.mit.edu
