Equations for a successful career

What makes career decisions so hard?

At some point, all of us have struggled with tough choices. But is there a way to make these decisions without an ounce of regret?

There are a number of concerns looming over the heads of young professionals when opting for their respective fields: Financial concerns, job uncertainty and fear of failure are all common challenges we face while choosing a career.

The truth is, no one knows what the world will look like 10 or 15 years from now. In fact, a report by the World Economic Forum indicates that nearly 40% of the workers around the world fear that their job might become obsolete in the next five years or even sooner.

As a student, you want to pursue a career path that aligns with your values, passions and skills, but that is not always possible. You may also want to choose a career that gives you a sense of purpose. These career decisions usually involve a huge amount of uncertainty. More often than not, the result is increased job dissatisfaction.

Goals and habits

As young professionals start their journey, they often try to identify a career roadmap or formula to follow to achieve career success. The two variables in the career success equation are: goals and habits. While goals provide a sense of direction and help you focus, effective habits give you the mental discipline to reach your goals.

If either variable is missing, the equation simply doesn’t add up.

It is important to make a sound career choice after performing a thorough self assessment. Performing a self assessment that addresses your values, interests, skills and personality traits will help you quickly rule out certain careers, and put you on the path to identifying more appropriate options.

Today, there are many self-assessment tools that gather information about a candidate and then produce a list of occupational matches.

Success and satisfaction

The more time you invest in ‘thinking and doing’, the better the chances of success and satisfaction in your career. The variables one needs to consider in this regard are: Vision (Know what your career goal is), Plan (Have an action plan to achieve those goals), Discipline (Develop the resilience and self-control to follow through with the plan), Timing (Make important career choices, decisions and moves at the right time).

Importance of experience

A career development plan, as established earlier, is like a road map that gets you from point A (choosing a career) to point B (finding your first job), and eventually to point Z (grow and advancing in your career).

Most of the successful career decisions share a few common variables — an unconventional idea, a talent to transcend boundaries and necessary exposure.

Sometimes our ideas are transformational enough to command exposure.

Other times, however, gaining exposure can be challenging. Getting out there and getting the experience is a surefire way to learn more. While many of the skills required for a successful career come from your academic experience, others can be developed through experiences such as internships and research projects.

One rule of thumb is that the higher the stakes in a career path, the more difficult the decision. You will likely always be uncertain about many aspects of your career. Sometimes, we choose badly, or make the wrong decision because of circumstances beyond our control.

The more aware you are of your decisions, the more effective they are.

(The author is the founder & CEO of a career counselling platform)