How to make the Right Career Choice at the Point of Confusion

People are always faced with the challenge of picking the right Choice of career, when the time comes for you to pick a career, you will discover that you have a multitude of options. It can be difficult to pick one, especially if you have no idea what you want to do ... or if many things appeal to you. Does it seem like an insurmountable task? It's not. Yes, you will have to put some effort into making your decision, but your effort will be well worth it in the end. If you follow these steps, you can successfully choose a suitable career and avoid making a big mistake.

When the time comes for you to pick a career, you will discover that you have a multitude of options. It can be difficult to pick one, especially if you have no idea what you want to do ... or if many things appeal to you. Does it seem like an insurmountable task? It's not. Yes, you will have to put some effort into making your decision, but your effort will be well worth it in the end. If you follow these steps, you can successfully choose a suitable career and avoid making a big mistake.

What do you want to do (Assessing yourself)

The most common question I'm asked is this one: "I don't know what I want to do. Is there a test or something that can tell me what career is right for me?" The answer is no. You can't take a test that will, as if by magic, tell you what to do with the rest of your life. You can, however, use a combination of self-assessment tools that will aid you in your decision. This article will demystify this phase of the career planning process.

During a self-assessment, you gather information about yourself to make an informed career decision. A self-assessment should include a look at your values, interests, personality, and aptitude.

• Values: the things that are important to you, like achievement, status, and autonomy
• Interests: what you enjoy doing, i.e., playing golf, taking long walks and hanging out with friends
• Personality: a person's individual traits, motivational drives, needs and attitudes
• Aptitudes: the activities you are good at, such as writing, computer programming, and teaching. An aptitude may be a natural skill or one you acquired.

Many people choose to hire a career counselor who will administer a variety of self-assessment inventories. What follows is a discussion of the different types of tools you may encounter, as well as some other things to consider when using your results to help you choose a career.

What and What Occupation Would you Love to Venture Into

You will probably have multiple lists of occupations in front of you at this point—one generated by each of the self assessment tools you used. To keep yourself organized, you should combine them into one master list.

First, look for careers that appear on multiple lists and copy them onto a blank page. Title it "Occupations to Explore." Your self assessment indicated they are a good fit for you based on several of your traits, so it is definitely worth considering them.

Next, find any occupations on your lists that appeal to you. They may be careers you know a bit about and want to explore further. Also, include professions about which you don't know much. You might learn something unexpected. Add those to your master list.

Work on What you Would Love Doing

What is Career Exploration?

Career exploration is the second stage of the career planning process. During the first stage, a self assessment, you learn about your personality, interests, aptitudes, and values. After using various tools to gather this information, you are left with a list of careers that are a good fit for someone with traits similar to yours.

Although the careers on your list appear to be suitable, it does not mean you can just go ahead and randomly choose any one of them. There are other things to consider. Each occupation has characteristics that will make it a better idea to choose some over others.

Since you can only have one career at a time, your goal, after learning about all the careers that might be a good fit for you, is to eventually have one remaining that is the BEST fit. Try not to eliminate any profession from your list until you do some research, even if you think you know something about it. You may be surprised by what you learn when you dig for information. If you cross a career off your list because of some preconceived notion, you could end up eliminating one of your best options.

Create a "Short List"

At this point, you must begin to narrow down your list even more. Based on what you learned from your research so far, you can start to eliminate the careers you don't want to pursue any further. You should have no more than between two and five occupations on your short list.

There may be jobs on your original list with duties that don't appeal to you. You may discover that a career that looked interesting has a weak job outlook. Maybe you are unable to or unwilling to fulfill the educational or other requirements of a particular occupation, or you lack some of the soft skills necessary to succeed in it. If your reasons for finding a career unacceptable are non-negotiable, cross it off your list.

Conduct Informational Interviews

I realized how many people don't know about using an informational interview to learn about an occupation when I sat in front of the computer with a friend searching for information on medical transcription, a career she was considering. After about a half hour of weeding out sites that advertised training programs from those that actually gave information on this job, her husband asked her this simple question: "Why don't you call Joe's mother?

She's a medical transcriptionist." I looked scornfully at my friend, who hadn't mentioned knowing someone in the field, and began to lecture her on the importance of informational interviews.

Make Your Career Choice

Finally, after doing all your research, you should feel reasonably ready to make your choice. Pick the occupation that you think will bring you the most satisfaction based on all the information you have gathered. It is important to realize that you are allowed do-overs if you change your mind about your choice at any point in your life. Many people change their careers at least a few times.

Outline Your Goals

There's an old Yiddish proverb: "Man plans, God laughs." It's true that life often gets in the way of our plans, but does that mean we shouldn't make them? Of course not. An unplanned future would be chaotic. You should, however, be flexible enough to amend your plans when the need arises. One way we plan for the future is by setting goals. A goal is "the end toward which effort is directed," according to Merriam-Webster.com.

Goal setting is a major component of the career planning process. Your goals, and the steps you take to achieve them, will make up your career action plan. This is the roadmap that will take you from choosing a career to succeeding in it. In this context, your goals will be your career objectives, for example, a particular occupation, a rung on the career ladder or an earnings level.

Short- and Long-Term Goals

Goals can be broadly classified into two categories: short-term goals and long-term goals. Generally, short-term goals are those you can achieve in six months to three years while it can take three to five years to reach long-term ones. Your long-term goals may be, for instance, earning a bachelor's degree in accounting, passing your certified public accounting exam and getting a job as an accountant. Your short-term goals, which will lead to achieving your long term ones, might be completing your college applications, getting accepted into college, enrolling, and earning a good grade point average.

Write out the Necessary Steps to Achieve Your Career

A career action plan is a written document that lays out all the steps that will help you reach your primary goal of working in your chosen occupation. You can think of it as a roadmap that will take you from point A to B, and then to C and D. It should include all your short and long-term goals and the steps you will have to take to reach them. You should also include any anticipated barriers to achieving your goals and ways to overcome them.

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