“Choose a job you love, and you will never have to work a day”. These age-old and wise words of Confucius are of prime relevance even today. People are often frustrated and dissatisfied with their work life. The root of all these evils can be traced to wrong career decisions. Life has become tougher and more competitive day by day. Today, choosing a career has thus become a topic of paramount importance.
Oxford Dictionary defines career as “an occupation undertaken for a significant period of a person’s life and with opportunities for progress.” A careful insight into this definition can tell us a lot about the importance of career.
Career is the identity of a person. It is the most important aspect of a person’s life. Not only professional life, the personal life of an individual also depends and is deeply influenced by the career he chooses. Career determines the kind of lifestyle one will lead and his/her position in the society.
What is more important than simply going for a job is choosing the right career. This is a million dollar question. Being in a right career is not only important for one’s personal and mental wellbeing, but also beneficial for the country’s development and happiness of its people. By choosing the right career, an individual can give his/her full potential to the work and at the same time, be happy and satisfied with his or her work. Just imagine it on a large scale—all people giving their best, an efficient and happy workforce. This is exactly what a country needs for its economic and overall development.
While everyone dreams of a good lifestyle and position in the society, not everyone is able to build a strong career that can ensure the same. In the Indian scenario, choosing the ‘right’ career is different from what it should ideally be. ‘Right career’ in Indian context has been what the elders, parents, relatives and other external influencers think is right rather than the choice and interests of the individual whose career is being dictated.
The decision about career choices should be taken at early stages of one’s life. The sooner the better. But children at this stage are naive and inexperienced. So what is needed is proper guidance, counselling and moral backing from parents for them to make the right choice. It has often been observed that parents try to dictate their children’s career choices influenced by their own unfulfilled goals and sometimes comparing their kids to the ‘standards’ set by the other kids. Soon after a child is born, the parents mentally decide what their kid is to become in future. And usually it revolves around two most notoriously populated career options, doctor or engineer. This is and has been proved wrong at so many levels. This attitude has led to frustration and failures in the life of many individuals. But nowadays, things are changing; thanks to the internet and increasing level of consciousness and understanding among the parents.
Having said so, one cannot deny the travail of this critical task of choosing the right career. Various factors should be considered meticulously before coming to a final decision. We can classify the factors broadly into two categories, internal factors and external factors. Interests of the individual, hobbies, domain knowledge, person’s mental aptitude and ability to work hard come under internal factors while financial resources, available institutions, training facility and market demand are the external factors.
A child’s interest should be considered before anything else. One cannot forcefully devote one’s important time to a work in which his or her interest doesn’t lie. Now having interest alone won’t help. Mental ability and willpower also matter. If you are physically unfit and unwilling to sweat yourself then your mere interest in sports just because you adore MS Dhoni or any of your favourite sportsperson won’t help. Availability of relevant institutions for proper training and guidance is also important. Colleges, universities and training centres for the career of interest is a must if one wants to go ahead and excel in that particular field. Money is another issue that comes up. A young man may possess all the training and skills for running an industry but he cannot venture to be an entrepreneur if he lacks sufficient financial resources and funding sources. Last but not least, one should also put an eye on the demand of the job that the career provides and its attractiveness in terms of salary and other perks before finalising the career. A job which makes you work hard but doesn’t provide enough compensation or chance to grow isn’t worth taking.
Right after a kid completes his High School, he is under pressure to choose between streams that would finally be a great decisive factor in his future career decisions. Common notion in the Indian education system determines the stream based on the kid’s performance in the exams. Schools and colleges prefer high scoring students for Science stream followed by Commerce and then finally Humanities. High scoring and intelligent students are literally forced by parents and relatives to take up Science stream even if his interest lies in Humanities. This is the blunder that makes the nation cry when multiple news of suicides come from across the country. Most of these suicides are related to not qualifying the entrance exams or due to excessive stress. Underperformance and unable to keep up to their parent’s high expectations lead the kids to take such drastic decisions. It is not only irrational but also morally wrong on the parents’ part. This makes career counselling an important part of a child’s education. Career counsellors assist in discovering a student’s potential and aptitude and accordingly suggest the right course of study to enhance the student’s career prospects.
There are a plenty of professions, careers, trades and jobs to choose from. Professional courses like Civil Engineering, Computer Science Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, and various medical courses are highly desired and sought after by the Indian youth. Apart from these popular courses, there is a plethora of interesting and rewarding career options that are gaining popularity among the kids who want to differentiate themselves from the crowd and do something different. Few among such courses include Food Technology, Textile Engineering, Hotel Management, Nursing, Archaeology, Photography, Animation, Journalism, Pharmacy, Ayurveda and many more. Many young people choose careers based on their hobby and interest like music, dance and other performing arts and excel in them.
As Abraham Lincoln said : “The best way to predict the future is to create it”. Choosing a right career is a long, well researched and properly counselled process crucial to the ‘creation’ of a child’s future which should not be taken in haste. Parents and guardians including teachers play an important role in shaping a child’s future. They should observe the child’s talent, interests and provide all sort of support to the child in deciding the right career.