1. Chapter 2
Planning Your Career

2. Why Do People Work? To meet their needs, wants, and goals.
Provides a sense of purpose
Helping others
Making a difference
Gain a sense of identity
Work typically becomes a way of life, strongly linked to your identity

3. Factors Affecting Career Choice

4. Values and Lifestyle Values: things that are important to you
People and things
Quality of work life
Social standing
Recreation and leisure time
Purchasing power
Comfort and convenience
Religion, politics, and culture

5. Values and Lifestyle Lifestyle: how you choose to live your life
What you buy and own
Where you live
What do you with your spare time
Whom you know and associate with
How you make decisions

6. Aptitudes and Interests
Aptitude: a natural physical or mental ability that allows you to do certain tasks well.
Good at math
Good a problem-solving
Interests: the things you like to do.

7. Personal Qualities
Personality: made up of the many individual qualities that make you unique.
Intelligence
Sense of humor
Creativity
Attitude

8. Steps in Career Planning
Self-analysis
Research
Plan of action
Re-evaluation

9. Self-analysis
Using resources available from schools, employment offices, testing services, and online, explore personal factors that relate to your career choice.
Determine wants and needs
Determine values and desired lifestyle
assess aptitudes and interest and see how they meet job tasks
Analyze your personal qualities and the kinds of task that best suit your personality

10. Research
Based on a good self-analysis, determine the careers that best suit your interest and aptitudes and will help you meet your lifestyle goals.
Seek information in books, magazine, websites, and other resources
Compare your interests, aptitudes, and personal qualities to job descriptions and requirements.
Talk to people in the fields of work you like.
Observe occupations, spend time learning about jobs and companies, and seek part-time work to get direct experience.

11. Plan of Action
After you have done some job research, develop a plan of action that will eventually bring you to your career goals.
Use good job search techniques.
Develop necessary skills by taking courses and gaining exposure to the field in which you want to pursue a career.
Seek a part-time or volunteer job to gain experience in your area of choice.
Evaluate your choices over time.

12. Re-evaluation
About every five years, think about what you will be doing and where you would like to be in the next five years, and re-evaluate yourself.

13. The Importance of Goals
Goal- a desired end toward which efforts are directed.
Provide a sense of direction and purpose in life.
There are three types of goals:
Short-term
Intermediate
Long-term

14. Setting Goals Short-Term Goals (will happen in a few days or weeks)
Pass a test
Get an interview
Complete a checklist

15. Setting Goals
Intermediate Goals (will happen in a few months or years)
Finish a course
Get a job
Save money for a car

16. Setting Goals Long-Term Goals (five years or longer) Finish college
Get married
Buy a house

17. Setting Goals
If goals are to be meaningful, they should be defined and realistic, and written down to become a part of your life.

18. Experience
Experience is the knowledge and skills acquired from working in a career field.
As you gain experience in a field, you become more valuable to your employer.

19. 2.2 Finding Career Opportunities

20. Sources of Job Opportunity Information
Contacts
School counseling and placements services
Public and private employment agencies
Newspaper, Yellow Pages, and private job listings
Online job information

21. Contacts
Contact--a member of your network, such as a relative, friend, member of a group to which you belong.
Can provide you with inside information on job openings.
Job shadowing– spending time with a worker in the type of job that interests you.

22. School Counseling and Placement Centers
Cooperative education– where students attend classes part of the day and then go to a job that provides supervised field experience.
Students receive credits for working and are paid as well.

23. Public and Private Employment Agencies
Employment agencies—help job seekers find a job for which they are qualified.
They also help employers locate the best applicants for job openings.
Private employment agencies may or may not charge a fee for their services.

24. Headhunters and Temp Agencies
Headhunter– a type of employment agency that seeks out highly qualified people to fill important positions for an employer.
Temporary agency—provides part- or full-time temporary job placement.
Working as a temporary employee gives you a chance to make an impression and expand your network.
If a company sees you are a good fit, it may try to buy out your contract with the temp agency, or contact you when a full-time position opens up.

25. Newspaper, Yellow Pages, and Private Job Listings
The help wanted ads in the classified section of your local newspaper list job openings in your area.
The Yellow Pages is an alphabetically arranges subject listing of businesses advertising their services.
Many companies, government offices, an schools place job opening announcements on bulletin boards, circulate them within the organization, and post them on their websites.

26. Online Job Information
Searching the Internet using keywords related to your chosen career field will provide many new sources of job information.
Some web sites are specifically designed to help people find jobs and allow you to post your resume for employers to see.
Monster, Yahoo! Jobs, CareerBuilder

27. Job Search Techniques
Your work history is a record of the jobs you have held and how long you stayed with each employer.
Employers will evaluate your work history when you apply for a job.
If it shows that you have changed jobs frequently without a logical career progression, potential employers might think hiring you is risky.

28. Job Search Techniques Get organized. Make a plan. Follow up.
Don’t give up.
Employers will evaluate your work history, a record of your past jobs and how long you held them, when you apply for a job.

29. Get Organized
Prepare a checklist of things to do and check them off as you complete them.
Assemble all information gathered about type of work you want
List prospective companies where you would like to work
Gather info and research job descriptions, etc.
Make lists of personal contacts, places to go, etc.
Prepare a current resume and application letter
Ask previous employers, teachers, to write letters of recommendation for you. Ask if you can use them for references.
Update your placement folder at school

30. Make a Plan
This is important to the success of your job search because it keeps you organized, shows what you have done, and indicated what you need to do in the immediate future.
Lists all of your goals
Shows a time frame for getting them done

31. Follow Up
After you have contacted a potential employer by letter or by filling out an application for a job opening, or after you have interviewed, check back from time to time.
They will know you are still interested in the job

32. Don’t Give Up
Before you get a good job, you will probably not get several other jobs that you apply for.
Remain courteous and upbeat, and keep checking back for openings.
Try all your job leads.
Be prepared for an interview

33. Getting the Job Job Tools Covered in this Chapter: Application Letter
Resume
Reference letter
Employment application
Job interview
Thank you letter