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January 12, 2009
Careers Planning is FUN
I don’t like the words ‘careers planning’. It sounds dull and miserable if you asked me. Because many of us associate negative feelings with the words ‘career’ and ‘planning’. Of course if you’re reading this, you are interested in looking at getting out of your career (or starting a career) so if you’re looking at getting out, then that’s probably where these negative associations come from!
And there’s only a handful of people out there who genuinely like ‘planning’! But that’s because they’re associating planning with planning other things in their lives or work, that perhaps was a bit dull. Planning your career on the other hand is a surprisingly energizing and enjoyable process. The thing is, you might not believe me, but then you haven’t done it properly have you? So what have you got to base this on? Because if you have done it properly, you wouldn’t be sitting here now reading this!
Still with me then?
Your Ideal Career is Out There and YOU Must Find it
I want to help you to identify the right career for you; your ideal career. Because I believe there is one out there (more than one actually) for everyone. But only you can find it. Don’t think for a second that someone else will find it for you. Or that an online careers test will tell you correctly. That’s a common trap of thought that holds so many people back. And there are other things that get in your way too….
Avoid This Approach
My concern is that there’s plenty of weak advice out there on the internet. There are short articles that skim over what careers planning is all about. They offer things like ‘10 Things to Think About..” or similar. I worry that people take these 10 things and think that they are embarking on an adequate careers planning process. You’re absolutely going to need to dig much deeper than this. These articles are not sufficient.
Who am I to Tell You This?
Having gone through the process myself sufficiently (I know I did it sufficiently because I’ve been working in my ideal career for 6 years now, getting steadily better and better at it as I go along because of the drive I earned myself by making the right choices), I know what it takes. And as I said, I also know that it was thoroughly enjoyable. How can thinking about the things you’re good at, the things that people respect you for, the things that people admire you for, the things that you can do to help other people with, the things you could do that you love that you’d get paid to do……how can this not be enjoyable??
The Right Way
It takes time, a small amount of money (to buy the right resources - I sincerely doubt you’ll dig up adequate resrources online for free - sure you’ll find tasters and teasers that may provide value and set the ball rolling, but I genuinely believe that if you want to take the process seriously, you need to be prepared to exchange value for value) and of course it takes an amount of your effort or energy (although I’ve already said, you get this back as you’re doing it!)
My advice to you for now, is to stop procrastinating and to jump straight in to a sensible methodical planning process. You just need your brain, your eyes, and pen and paper. And I strongly suggest you start off with the book ‘The Pathfinder’ which you can see on the right of this screen. Check out the customer reviews on Amazon to be sure (it’s consistently spoken highly of), order yourself a copy, and get going with it.
And stop the slow, tedious, lengthy process of just posting comments in online forums that say, ‘please help me’. Because you attract people’s OPINIONS when you do that. And opinions are just that….opinions. The problem is, opinions often get acted upon and lead the wrong way. The best people to get advice from in any field or area in business or in life in general, are people who already have achieved what it is you’re trying to achieve. They have experienced what works. The opinion or advice of anyone advising you on your career path who are not themselves working in their ideal career, should be taken with a pinch of salt. As should online careers tests. You need to create peace of mind in yourself that you’re making the right career decision, and you don’t get that from opinions. You get that from facts and figures, a sensible, logical careers planning process. Don’t say I didn’t tell you! 
Checkout ‘The Pathfinder’ (to the right of your screen). It doesn’t tell you what to do for a career, it tells you how to find out what to do.…It’s a small investment with perhaps the biggest return you’ll ever get in your life.
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