Career Planning

Imagine a situation where you cleared the Engineering exam entrance and did get a good rank, got admitted to a good government college with the hope of a good planning placement. After completing the hectic four years in the college, the placement companies do not select you because you did not pass their interview or did not like the position they offered you, then what? What happens next, where to apply, how to get it?

A similar situation can happen when someone realizes they do not want to study the course and would like to change the course or college entirely. This might not be feasible for many of the students so they continue with what they are doing. I had a friend who changed from a Dental College to a BA course in Economics, it cost her three years. There are plenty of students who are currently struggling due to lack of planning before entering a college.

Easy Solution Planning

An easier solution for such a problem is something called career counselling or career planning. The term holds more than the academic definition of planning the career. It refers to researching options available, recognizing your strengths and matching your interests. It is a throughout process which should ideally start from the tenth or twelfth grade in High school. For Indian students, career planning plays a huge role in determining employment opportunities for the future. Since Medical and Engineering is gradually coming off the trend of Indian societies, it becomes essential to know other career paths.

Before we can start learning about the process of career planning, we need to understand a few myths regarding it. ‘The choice of your major determines your future job’ is a popular myth which students still like to believe and indulge in. However, a choice of the subject only gives a general education to a student. Be it an Undergrad or Masters, any degree cannot guarantee a person a job in the same field. For example, I am currently pursuing my Masters in Economics along with freelancing as a UX designer. I may even start working as a full-time designer after graduation. Hence, my choice of subject is something that I am interested in and want to study rather than have a career in it. These misconceptions are quite evident when one enters the workforce.

Learn Skills

People usually end up doing things their college did not teach them, which is why it is advised to learn skills outside college as well. Moreover, some skills become obsolete in a few years, which harms the youngsters who weren’t prepared for the change. According to statistics, in a few years, Data Analytics would become outdated. In such a case, career planning becomes necessary. Another myth about a career is that it is irreversible.

There are so many examples of people out there who started as something else and became something else, such as the well- known writer Chetan Bhagat- who started as an engineer and became an author. This proves that there is no truth in the statement.

Moving on to the process of career planning, one thing that needs to be noted is that career is something which will affect everyone around you, however, it should also be your own decision. The family, relatives, society and mentors play a huge role when it comes to the choice of career but personal opinion is more important than anything else.

No one would like to pursue Architecture just because they had peer pressure whereas they are interested in Interior Design. Here comes the need of counselling; the primary job of a counsellor is to inform you regarding various market trends and help you identify your strengths, in the end, the decision is your call.

Furthermore, one must always keep in mind that career planning involves flexibility and one must be ready to make compromises. A tip to ease career planning is to make networks or what we call as networking. Talk to seniors, mentors, relatives or anyone who is in the workplace and get an idea of what work they do. How they do it, what led them to that work? When you are aware of the market around you and what the employers are looking for, it becomes easy to choose a pathway that leads you to your dream job.

In the end, the new generation which has so many options to choose from is in a desperate need of career planning. The employment market has become so dynamic that it is hard to predict which job will prevail for more than five years. Under such circumstances, career planning becomes the need of the hour.

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Author – Sanskriti Singh