Everyone has ambitions and when these ambitions relate to a career, you can find yourself with a strong sense of personal drive to obtain your goals because it’s often tied to financial gain which can be necessary to live comfortably. However, it’s not always as easy to achieve these goals as it might feel in your head and that can quickly lead to frustration.
When it does, the pendulum can swing the other way and it can start feeling as though it’s impossible to move forward towards your dream career. That’s not the case, but in order to become fully aware of this, you’ll need to know the options that you have in order to make yourself more appealing in the eyes of prospective employers or opportunities.
Studying and Qualifications
To some people, working up the career ladder by going from job to job, gathering more experience as you go, might seem like an entirely different route to take than studying or getting a degree. The two are much more linked than some may think, and while that may seem obvious based on the fact that the primary use of a degree is to further your employability, the process of studying can often be what raises questions. Fortunately, the mode of studying itself is something that you have a large degree of control over and there are several options at your disposal. The most obvious of these options, if you were to focus on getting a degree, would be to attend a physical university. However, the money and commitment that is required with that isn’t something that is going to be realistic for everyone. It might be especially unrealistic for those with jobs or responsibilities that require consistent attention.
Another option that you have is to study online. Studying online is a route that you can take which can skip over some of the problems presented by attending a physical place of education and can offer you a convenient way of getting the qualifications that you seek. While you still might often find it a lot of work to balance your studies with the responsibilities of your everyday life, being able to work it around your own schedule to a certain degree can make it a whole lot more realistic. So, the question might then become one of deciding which degree to obtain or study. This is obviously a matter unique to yourself and will greatly depend on what it is that you want to accomplish in regards to your career and what you think will benefit you getting there. That being said, if your career ambitions are related to you pursuing a career in business, then it might be worth researching accredited online MBA programs to see how you can take the steps to start these courses and improve your chances of finding success in that field.
It’s important to remember that it isn’t all necessarily about the degree at the end of it, but also about the experience and knowledge that you gather through the act of completing the course. This can lead you to being more confident about your field when the time comes for you to put your teachings into action and can help transition what you know from the theoretical to the practical. Furthermore, this means that by the time you finish studying, you (who now has a qualification) won’t simply be the same ‘you’ as before– but someone with a clearer vision of where they want to go and how they plan on getting there.
Work on Your Presentation
Before you go to a job interview or even just apply for a job, there’s a certain aspect that you might be tempted to try and simply skip. Never assume that your prospective employers will have all of the relevant information that they need about you – that you’re simply there to answer questions. Unfortunately, you’re going to have to do a whole lot more work than that. You have to convey all of the relevant information about you to them, including why you want the job and why you’re right for the job, all while ensuring that you present yourself in the best possible light. This isn’t easy, and there are factors such as personal confidence that can hugely impact how easy certain people will find this part of the process. It might even seem unfair how sometimes those who are hiring might choose someone over another person because they’re more qualified and other times, simply because they seemed like the right person for the job.
It’s incredibly difficult to try and depict yourself as being more confident and affable than you usually feel like you are, but there are ways in which you can practice and simply apply it to the right situations instead of having to change your whole personality. This is just one aspect of the ‘presentation’ angle that you have to concern yourself with, however. Your approach to the job application and your CV are going to be the only chance that you have at a first impression, so it’s important that you put all of the effort in that you feel is necessary. If those who are reviewing the documents don’t find you have sold yourself as well as you could have, they’ll likely just pick someone else who did, which means you won’t get a chance to talk about all of the relevant experience and know-how that you have that you were holding back for whatever reason.
If you’re struggling with these aspects, there is a simple solution that could prove to be quite beneficial to you. Doing some research online into the best ways to answer questions that regularly come up in job applications and interviews can help you to get a better understanding of the kinds of things that will be expected of you. Additionally, if you’re struggling to present your CV in a way that draws attention and delivers information effectively, templates and other such resources can be found online and should be easily accessible if you know where to look. Furthermore, using these in tandem with practicing your interview technique with friends or family members can help you to feel more prepared which is a great place for you to be. You don’t want to be caught off-guard once you’re in the interview room and find yourself floundering, there’s nothing wrong with taking a bit of time to think if you’re confronted with a question that you aren’t immediately sure how to answer.
Put in Extra Work
As stated before, when things aren’t going your way in regards to your employment, it’s easy to become frustrated and feel as though you’ve come up against a wall. You’ve done everything that you possibly can, so where do you go from here? Sometimes the answer is less obvious than you might expect and it involves doing things that simply feel like more effort; effort that doesn’t even guarantee results. It’s important to try and be as positive about these kinds of things as possible because it’s hard to tell when exactly something will pay off and when it won’t but going in with the right attitude and doing things because they have a chance of helping you down the line can shine through.
Depending on the kind of field that you would like to find yourself in, the kind of work that you’ll be putting in during your free time will vary massively. For example, if you’re an aspiring artist who was looking to find work in a particular field, you might want to start your own platform where you can make your identity as a content creator known, gathering as much of an audience as you can on your own and then directing your potential employers to this platform when the time comes to apply for work. This whole experience can be something positive in the sense that it can actually help you to perfect your craft and grow in ways that you wouldn’t have otherwise. While you might not be getting directly paid for the work like this that you do in your own time, it can benefit you in such ways that make you more of an appealing candidate.
Even something as simple as volunteering with charities and other such causes can reflect well on you during the application or interview and can help you to improve your presentation, as it’ll help you to depict yourself as a hard worker. Furthermore, depending on the kind of work that you’re doing with these charities, you might even be able to glean some personal benefit out of it, as many people report that these experiences can help them to learn new skills and feel more connected to the community and world around them. Sometimes, it’s just best to take action when you feel as though nothing is moving for you. It’s rare that the cogs start turning themselves, usually, it’s down to you to ensure that you’re in a position to push yourself forward.
