KOCHI: Choosing the right career and course is imperative as they are part of one’s active life. Landing yourself in the wrong job or course will only cause dissatisfaction and frustration.
Blindly following ‘passion’ due to unrealistic motivation from influencers, leaders, teachers, parents, and mainstream media, without critical analysis and evaluation of one’s strengths and weaknesses will only keep the person perplexed in the long run and drain the parents’ money in vain. Now, this has become an overwhelming situation in contemporary society.
Many students and parents are filled with frustrations and unmet ambitions. Then there are people working lower than their education qualifications. So, set your goal meticulously and critically rather than feelings or thoughts.
Indecisiveness in choosing the right career path and course can be tackled when two factors, ‘Should Not Be’ and ‘Should Be’ are considered.
Keep in mind these pointers under ‘Should Not Be’:
Immature passion
We often hear the terms, ‘follow your passion’ or ‘follow your dream’. However, what’s often disregarded is one’s ability and opportunities. Passion and dreams only work for a tiny fraction of people, especially for those who have analysed their abilities and opportunities. So it is better to replace passion and dreams with abilities and opportunities.
Unrealistic motivations
Motivational talks are aplenty around us. Chances of making spontaneous decisions out of excitement do not always help. For example, the advertisements of coaching institutions are always about the rarest or most exceptional stories. However, they are presented as anybody can achieve those feats. It misleads students and parents from making the right choices. Most competitive exams such as CA/CS, Medical/Engineering Entrance, UPSC/PSC exams, etc, have very low success rates. So always accept reality and consistently work hard.
Another side of education loan
Education loans of hefty amounts often unfold many stressful years of repayment after education, further damaging young lives. Students are secondary beneficiaries of these loans, but primary beneficiaries are banks, colleges, the government, etc. So one must be cautious of making career decisions based on education loans.
For the ‘Should Be’, consider these:
Cognitive abilities
Cognitive abilities or intelligence quotient can be easily explained and understood by monitoring the rate of learning. Analyse scores received at high school. If a student scores high in language or arts subjects, their ability orientation towards creativity would be higher.
Personality Traits
There are five personality traits that will help understand the temperament of a person — openness, conscientiousness, extroversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism. A person who is open to new experiences can have a wide range of interests and also could be imaginative and insightful. For jobs such as tour guides and travel writers, a person needs this trait.
Whereas, conscientiousness means having a kind of orderliness. Such persons can be dutiful, and hardworking, like rules and orders, structure and integrity. A position like an accountant or manager requires such traits.
Extroversion is being sensitive to positive emotions and they are talkative, energetic, assertive, sociable and may have a high amount of emotional expressiveness. For jobs in sales, event management, personal trainers etc this personality is important.
Agreeableness is a temperamental disposition to be agreeable. It is characterised as kind, sympathetic, cooperative, warm and considerate. A teacher or a human resource specialist needs this particular trait. The fifth trait neuroticism is where people are more sensitive to negative emotions such as fear, anxiety and emotional pain. A social worker or a nurse needs this trait.
Opportunities
Occupations can be classified into STEM and HEAL jobs. People in STEM use their knowledge of science, technology, engineering and mathematics whereas HEAL jobs include fields of health, education, administration and literacy. Career or course selection must be based on abilities to fit for either STEM or HEAL jobs.
The writer is a consultant psychologist at SUT Hospital, Pattom