“The two most important days in your life are the day you are born and the day you find out why.” – Mark Twain
What if one decision at age 17 could echo through the rest of your life? Because in many ways, it will. I remember when I was your age. I had some friends who were clear about what they were going to do with their lives, but most of us were fuzzy on the issue. Some had a general direction and the sense of, well… just needing to start somewhere. Anywhere. Do something. One way or another we all muddled through and for some it worked out, for others, they spent the rest of their lives wondering why they made those early flawed choices.
As for me, well, I could not have had a clumsier journey. I have had many jobs, but in addition I changed careers 5 times. Some of those were useful, others a waste of time. Had I been guided more thoughtfully at an early age I could have avoided some of the dead-ends, circles, false-starts and over-stays. Of course, looking back I have no regrets, all experiences add to the mosaic of life and we learn from our mistakes. I definitely recall the period when I was at school and had to think of what comes next. I plucked some ideas from thin air and navigated my way through them. You can definitely do better than me.
If anything, the world these days seems even more confusing than it was then. There is popular talk of which jobs will even exist in 5 years, plus the way we become accomplished and sell our services has gone through a revolution itself. You can learn almost anything on the internet, and the default option of getting a degree or some qualification is no longer a given. There are professionals who are well versed in the world of work and using them to shine a light into the career darkness can save you many missteps and be exceptionally revealing. Yet, only a fraction of people ever gets professional career advice from a trained counsellor.
As already said, making a career decision is one of the most important choices you will ever make in your life. Yet many people seem to do it so casually and based on the flimsiest of evidence. We get ideas from the media, movies, our peer group, family, school subjects or even just plain old happenstance. Almost any role we imagine is romanticised, bearing little overlap with the job in the real world. I know people who grinded out 6 years at law school, hating every minute, became lawyers and worked at a law firm for 30 years even though the role gave them no purpose in life. Why? Because the version of law they saw on TV made it look exciting and meaningful. Once they qualified it seemed pointless to change direction because of the initial sunk cost and ongoing impracticality of extracting oneself from their lifestyle obligations. Starting over gets harder with age — though some do it, most don’t.
I looked at a recent survey of young people making career decisions.
The lowest scoring items both involved becoming more informed about possible career options. It seems it is rare, if you are thinking about pursuing a career, to seek out people already doing that job and ask about their experiences in the field. Meeting 4 or 5 people in this way promises to be illuminating, both in terms of the journey they took to get there and their everyday tribulations. Then spending time shadowing someone for a few days would be even more convincing. So many jobs where the essence seems attractive (e.g. therapist, doctor, engineer, accountant, shopkeeper, writer, phlebotomist, enologist) can be filled with many side components and laborious admin.
When your 17-year-old self makes a career decision, it needs all the help it can get. In some way you are making a weird bet with yourself that your 27-, 37-, 47- and 57-year-old selves will value then what you value now.
Of course, people change over time. But some things are less fluid than others. Personality, for example, does evolve, but less than you might think. Values are also pretty stable. Interests are more malleable as you encounter the world in different ways, but they often manifest in activities outside of work. Abilities on the other hand are quite fixed – you are unlikely to become good with numbers later in life if you weren’t already accomplished earlier.
This means there is merit in measuring components of self, like abilities, personality and interests to get a read on how they align with different career options.
For such an all-embracing decision, our view is that you should get professional help. The cost of such help is negligible compared to the cost of making a poor decision. In addition, career counsellors are fully neutral, with only your best interests at heart. While family and friends may seem like good sources of career advice, their experiences are probably more limited and they may have their own agendas to push you in one direction or another.
You should see career counselling not as a luxury, but as an essential service that can set you on a path that will totally enhance your life.
In short, I suggest the following course of actions:
- Book a session with a professional career counsellor and narrow your career options down to 3 clear possibilities.
- Talk to five people in careers you’re curious about asking questions about the qualifications required and what it is like everyday to do that job. Hear about the best parts and the worst parts.
- Then when you have been persuaded that you are on the right track, request to shadow someone in that role for a day or two.
If all of those steps line up, you’re likely making one of the most informed choices possible. Trust yourself, stay curious, and don’t be afraid to ask for help. Your future self will thank you.
Good luck!
Link to our Free Career Maturity Readiness Assessment
Complete the short inventory, and we’ll send you a personalized report to guide your next steps.
Your future self will thank you.
