STEP ONE:
What if you don’t know what you want to do?
Your job hunt will be more comfortable if you can figure out
what type of work you want to do. But you are not alone if you have no idea
what you want to do next! You may have knowledge and skills in certain areas
but want to get into another type of work. What The Wall Street Journal has
discovered in its research on careers is that most of us end up having at least
three distinctly different careers in our working lives; it seems that, even if
we really like a particular kind of activity, twenty years of doing it is
enough for most of us and we want to move on to something else!
That’s why we strongly believe that you need to spend some
time figuring out what interests you rather than taking an inventory of the
skills you have. You may have skills that you simply don’t want to use, but if
you can build your career on the things that interest you, you will be more
likely to be happy and satisfied in your job. Realize, too, that interests can
change over time; the activities that interest you now may not be the ones that
interested you years ago. For example, some professionals may decide that
they’ve had enough of retail sales and want a job selling another product or
service, even though they have earned a reputation for being an excellent
retail manager.
