Beech Tree News Network

Choosing a career was one of the hardest decisions that I ever made. Some people seem able to make that decision easily, while others – like me – struggle for a while. I watched my children go through the career decision-making process, and now my older grandchildren are at that point in their lives. People arrive at their decisions in different ways.

Many offer advice about how to choose a career. In one article, “10 Tips for Picking a Career Path in College” (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/perry-binder/choosing-a-major-career-path-...), author Perry Binder provided some interesting advice:
•    Do what you love, but don't let your career choices jeopardize anyone you love.
•    Determine whether you are driven to be your own boss or if you crave the stability of a steady paycheck.
•    Clean up your social media presence online! What's publicly available might not bode well for your future employment….In 2011, the Federal Trade Commission approved the practice of employers conducting social media background checks going back seven years for job applicants.

Additionally, in a U.S. News & World Report article (http://money.usnews.com/money/blogs/outside-voices-careers/2010/12/06/ho...), Tim Tyrell-Smith suggested some reflections while choosing a career might include: natural talents, work style, preferred work location, and preferred level of social interaction. The author also suggested some other considerations:
•    Work-life balance, such as the commute and possible overtime or weekend work.
•    The level of stress associated with a job.
•    How much money one would want (or need) to make.
These are certainly considerations many of us pondered in the decision-making process.

Two good sources of career information are online. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (http://www.bls.gov/emp/ep_table_104.htm) lists occupations with the largest job growth projected through the year 2022. Also, the Occupational Outlook Handbook (http://www.bls.gov/ooh/) provides a wealth of career information. These two sites are definitely worth visiting during the career decision-making process.

I asked friends and family how they decided on their career paths. Their responses are below:
•    My career was decided for me. Having a deaf child, I knew that I wanted to be able to communicate with my child. Interpreting for other deaf children through the years was the best career anyone could have asked for. God blessed me with my daughter and then showed me the way and the path to take with her.
•    Trial and error.
•    I liked chemistry in high school. I started toward pharmacy school, but decided I didn’t want to count pills. Read up on chemistry related careers. Engineering appeared to match my interests. So, I majored in chemical engineering. Once working in industry, I gravitated to maintenance because I liked troubleshooting and fixing problems. I then went into reliability engineering since it is proactive instead of reactive work. Mostly, too, because I don’t like getting called in to work to fix breakdowns.
•    It was the only thing I could see myself doing. I had two other majors, but I kept coming back to teaching.
•    What career? I’ve worked, but I don’t have a career.
•    In my first career, I followed the money. In my second career, I followed my heart.
•    The two careers I was interested in were pharmacist and teacher. After months of prayer and thinking, I knew I was being led to be a teacher. This is my 12th year of teaching, and I love it!
•    I knew a woman who did x-ray and always thought it sounded interesting. Started doing research and went to shadow her for two days.
•    I decided to do what I was good doing. I was always a strong writer and figured I wouldn’t be a good novelist, so I’d do the next best thing and teach others.
•    There were several reasons I chose to do nursing. The most important, I am almost embarrassed to say, is job security. Nursing jobs are available almost anywhere. I like to help people as well.
•    I shadowed and volunteered to determine whether I’d like my career.
•    Home Economics major got me my first job teaching sixth grade. I was hired by phone. This was in the early ‘60’s, so requirements were much different. I’ve never looked back. I loved my career. God has been so good to me.
•    When I was in school, two teachers helped me. I thought I wanted to teach home economics, but changed to physical education. I had the idealistic notion that I could help every child. I found out that I didn’t have to and couldn’t help every child. After about 30 years, I realized that if I had made a difference in five children’s lives that would be a great career. I also found that it’s true – what you do is more important than what you say.
•    No one told me when I was getting a degree that if you didn’t choose something specific like teacher, engineer, or nurse that it would be nearly impossible to find a decent job close to home. So, I got my first two degrees in business and then decided I would like to do something more hands on and be able to get a job almost anywhere, so I went back to be a physician’s assistant.
•    There were lots of careers I considered, but teaching came natural to me and I loved it from the start. Some of the other things I thought sounded great didn’t seem as easy a fit for me. I didn’t always know I wanted to be a teacher; but, once I was a teacher, I knew during that first year that I wanted to be a principal. I have loved every year in education. The past sixteen years have flown by! God has given me such a blessing.
•    While I stumbled around trying to feed my family, I worked in mining and surveying. To advance, I needed a four-year degree; without it, I was not going anywhere. My employer provided training and helped pay college expenses – as long as I maintained good grades. These opportunities allowed me to advance. I had gone into management and had to be willing to move from place to place. I came to realize that success depended on commitment to work. If you only have one talent or skill, you need to develop another talent or skill for versatility. Some people seem to think they don’t owe their employer anything beyond their set hours, but they owe them a good work ethic. Time, energy or resources shouldn’t be wasted; waste leads to failed business.
•    I fell into it.
•    I think the love of caring for and teaching children was bred into me. My mother has been nurturing children since 1980, and then I joined her after having my own children. We passed this love on to my daughter who loves, cares for and teaches children with us. Now, we are a family business three generations strong.

In today’s workplace, choosing a career or a job doesn’t necessarily mean that a person must stick to that line of work throughout life; we can re-evaluate and change our paths – sometimes with the help of retraining or additional education. As George Eliot said, “It is never too late to be what you might have been.”