Student Information

Career Development

1. Choosing a Career

1.1 The choice of a proper career determines one’s future life.  It is therefore very important that you find a career in which you will be happy.  Many adults are serving in occupations which they do not enjoy and for which they have little real ability due to the fact that they did not consider the choice of their career with the necessary seriousness.  To be able to make a wise and realistic choice of a career, you need to know yourself and to know about different careers.  You have to gain information that concerns mainly yourself – what is required for entry into the different occupations, job opportunities, and prospects.  It is strongly advisable to seek professional advice to find out what your special abilities and interests are.  For example, you can consult vocational psychologists and counsellors who may let you undergo a series of psychometric tests.  These are intelligence tests, interest tests as well as aptitude and personality tests.

1.2 To know who you are, you must be able to answer the following questions about yourself:
(i)  What abilities do I have?
Your abilities are those things which you are good at, for example, you can speak well or work well with your hands.   If you know that you struggle with maths it would not be a good idea to choose a career where you have to work with numbers.

(ii) What interests do I have?
                Your interests are those activities that you like to do.  Fore example, you may be interested in:

• Working with people, e.g. social work
• Working with science and technology
• Working with animals

(iii) What type of person am I?
Personality characteristics are important in the choice of a career, because people with certain personalities are better suited to some careers than to others.  For example, a very shy person may not choose a career where he/she had to appear in front of people.

2. Job search skills

The job interview

The purpose of the interview

- It is your chance to meet someone from the organisation and assess if he/she is offering you what you want.

- It gives the interviewers the chance to see if you match their requirements.  These requirements vary from job to job, but would typically include:

• Your intellectual qualities
• How you get on with people
• How enthusiastic you are
• How well you express yourself
• How you will fit in with the company and its values.

Preparation

• Be punctual
• Dress appropriately, e.g. do not wear a suit if you are going to waiter/waitress interview
• Do background research on the company
• Your non-verbal language is very important.  The first few seconds of the meeting are therefore vital.  Be confident
• Sit squarely, facing the interviewers
• Keep your hands in your lap if you tend to fidget
• Keep eye contact with the person you are addressing
• Smile appropriately (but not excessively).

3. Academic support

Motivation

Some characteristics of the learner who is intrinsically motivated (Mellet, 1989:62):

• A desire for internal enrichment
• Purposefulness
• He/she anticipates the realisation of a goal
• Concentrates on the learning task
• Perseveres and exercises
• He is interested in the objective
• Independent study
• Learning is for him a meaningful activity
• Intellectually inquisitive
• Has a strong will for successful completion of a task
• He sets a standard for himself
• Unsuccessful first attempts are not regarded as total failures and thy are repeated.