A survey found nearly 40% of Bachelor’s degree holders regret their career choices. To be more specific, they felt remorseful about their choice of major. While they still graduated, many admitted they wished they’d chosen a different field.
You don’t want to make the same mistake, as the wrong career choice can lead to job dissatisfaction. This can make you feel miserable, leading to overall discontentment. Regrets can also give rise to hopelessness, low self-esteem, anxiety, and depression.
For those reasons, you should educate yourself on choosing the right career. This can help you pick the correct path and be happy and satisfied with your decision.
To that end, we created this guide listing the top tips to aid you in making a more informed career choice. So read on; they could help you decide on one you’d be proud of even after retirement.
1. Define Your Career Values
Career values are personal beliefs and principles about your ideal professional environment. They represent the most important factors you consider in your work. They also help you describe what you believe is a meaningful career or job.
Understanding what you value most in your future career can help you filter your options. That’s because you already know what you want and what to look for in your professional life. So if a job opportunity doesn’t align with your values, you can avoid getting trapped in that role.
Because career values are personal, they can differ widely from person to person. To give you an idea, here are some examples:
- Artistic creativity
- Time freedom
- Public and social contact
- Beneficial contribution to society
- Environmental impact
- Work/life balance
- Autonomy
- Stability
- Mental or physical stimulation
Those are just examples; you may have different ones, so list them all. Then, assign them a number based on what you prioritize the most; for example, 1 being the top priority. You can then use this later on when exploring and comparing job opportunities.
2. Consider Your Personality
Personality refers to someone’s unique behaviors, characteristics, feelings, and thoughts. It’s one of the primary factors distinguishing a person from another.
Your personality can influence how happy and satisfied you can be in your career choice. It can also contribute to your success and your compatibility with others. Indeed, a study found that a career that aligns well with personality can make one more engaged.
For example, suppose you consider yourself an extrovert. You also love helping and teaching others and making a difference in their lives.
In the case above, you may be better off choosing a social, people-oriented career. This may include working in higher education, social welfare, school counseling, or coaching.
But if you’re an introvert, you may do better with independent, analytical tasks. You have many options, from sciences to graphic design to software development.
3. Factor in Your Interests
Interests are tendencies toward wanting to explore and learn more about something. Therefore, they can influence how likely you’d love your career and work environment. After all, if it interests you, you’re more likely to enjoy and keep doing it.
To help determine what your career interests are, ask yourself the following questions:
- What activities do you like doing?
- What makes those activities appealing to you?
- What were the happiest moments in your life?
- What were/are your favorite school subjects, and why?
After that, explore various types of careers that align with your answers.
4. Research Key Industry Income Statistics
Even if you don’t want to work in the highest-paying industries, you still want a career that pays well. This is especially true in the U.S., where living costs are about 20% higher than in other countries.
While your interests and passions are crucial, too, they may not be enough to feed you. Thus, when choosing a career path, you should also consider the potential income it can give you.
One way to determine how much you can make is to check industry statistics. If you’re in the U.S., an excellent resource to use is the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS). It provides national estimates of average earnings for all private-sector employees.
Other sources you can check are the following websites:
- PayScale.com
- Glassdoor.com
- Indeed.com
- Salary.com
- ZipRecruiter.com
Some of the above sites, such as Glassdoor and Indeed, also let employees review employers. So, check the ones for the companies you want to work for. Use these to your advantage to understand what it’s like working for those firms.
5. Mind Your Skills
By this time, you likely have narrowed down your list of desirable career options. The next step is to determine the skills needed to excel in them.
Suppose you want to be a software developer, the demand for which, by the way, is high. So much so that, according to the U.S. BLS, its employment rate will grow by 25% from 2021 to 2031. That’s much faster than the average for all occupations.
To be a great software developer, though, you have to:
- Be an expert coder
- Be an excellent communicator
- Work under time pressure and meet deadlines
- Be willing to pursue continuing quality education
If you don’t meet all of those qualifications, don’t worry, as they’re all “learnable.” For example, you can complete advanced degrees to become an expert coder. You can also take courses to improve your communication skills and time management.
The most important thing here is that you must be willing to learn and hone your skills. If not, you’re unlikely to be happy and feel satisfied with your career choice, regardless of what it is.
6. Try Apprenticeship
An apprenticeship combines hands-on learning, in-person instruction, and paid on-the-job training. It helps prepare workers to become successful in their chosen highly-skilled careers.
As an apprentice, you’ll work under the guidance and supervision of a master. “Master” refers to a person who teaches an apprentice and helps them develop their skills.
An apprenticeship can help you decide if a career is right for you as it lets you experience it firsthand. Even better, you can be as young as 16 to 18 to apply for a registered apprenticeship program in the United States. This means you can build work experience and develop and hone skills early on.
At the same time, you can use your actual, in-person OJT experience to gauge how much you like this type of job. If you don’t like it and don’t see yourself excelling at it, it’s not too late to back out.
7. Attend Your College Orientations
College orientations usually include pre-class consultations given by academic advisors.
Academic advisors are professional educators themselves. They guide students throughout the admission process, including course selection. Therefore, they can advise you on your chosen major, including its pros and cons.
It’s also during college orientations wherein you can speak with prospective professors. You can ask them about the subjects they teach. The information you gather can help you gauge your first choice for a degree.
So, use your college orientations to your advantage and attend all of them. They’re among the earliest ways to determine if your chosen major (and career path) suits you.
8. Choose Your Employer Wisely
A study published by Pew in 2022 found that over 6 in 10 polled U.S. workers left their jobs the year before due to low pay. A similar number of people quit because of a lack of advancement opportunities. This implies professional development is now as crucial as fair or high salaries.
Regardless of your qualifications for a role, they may be useless if the firm you work for doesn’t care. Thus, you should learn more about prospective employers before accepting their offers. Otherwise, your career may stagnate, and you may feel dissatisfied and unhappy.
So before applying and accepting job offers, research each of your prospective employers. Check the websites mentioned above that allow employees to review their employers. They can help you determine which firms are employee-centered and offer career advancements.
You should also read employee reviews about “bad” bosses or supervisors. Look for details regarding what actions their employers took to address these complaints. If they didn’t do anything, such as talk to the boss or supervisor, take that as a red flag.
A good enough reason is that your career growth doesn’t always depend on you or your employer. Your manager’s take on you and your performance can also influence it. So if your boss or supervisor is against your advancement, you may never experience it.
Unfortunately, bad bosses are prevalent in the United States. They’re so common that they’re among the top 10 reasons American workers quit or want to leave their jobs.
Decide on the Best Career Choice
Remember: Your career choice will impact your financial security, lifestyle, family, and retirement. In other words, it will affect your entire future. That’s a good enough reason to make the right, highly-educated one early on.
So if you have yet to decide which career path to take, consider following all our tips. They can help steer you in the right direction and prevent you from regretting your choice.
Ready for more career-related guides like this? Then check out our post about well-paying jobs that don’t even require a degree!
