Planning your Career? Follow the Roadmap!

Think about the steps you would take to plan a trip. In order to reach a final destination there is a place to begin, decisions to make about the route to follow (hopefully without too many detours!), and the need to organize many details in between departure and arrival. A good map is an essential tool to navigate your way.

Planning your career direction is no different from planning a trip. There is a place to begin, and many important decisions and details to consider before arriving at your chosen career. This journey too has a map, the Roadmap to Career Planning. Following the four steps of this map from beginning to end will help you reach your final destination successfully!

Step One: Increase Self Knowledge		Step Two: Explore Your Options
Step Three: Clarify Direction		Step Four: Arrive at Your Destination

Step One: Increase Self Knowledge. Knowing how your interests, talents and values relate to major and career options is an important place to begin your career planning. This can be accomplished in a variety of ways, from self reflection to a computer-based career assessment. Here are some specific steps that you can take to increase your self-knowledge:

Step Two: Explore your options. Now that you know more about yourself, you can use this information as a basis to learn more about specific career areas that are a good fit for you. Exploring a variety of career ideas is an important step that takes both time and effort. This step is often hurried through in an attempt to reach a decision. However, the payoff for putting ample energy into exploration is a well developed plan for the next step and more confidence in your career direction. Here are some specific steps that you can take to explore your options:

Step Three: Clarify Direction. Confirming your major choice and career focus requires applying both self knowledge and career exploration results to an experiential or hands-on learning environment. This means finding an internship, summer or part-time job, or volunteer opportunity related to your major or career interest. These experiences serve to confirm your direction. Here are some activities that can help clarify your direction:

Step Four: Arrive at Your Destination. In reality, the "destination" is the end of your undergraduate academic experience, and therefore the beginning of a new journey. At this point, you'll need to make a decision, preferably in your junior year, about the direction you will take after graduation: to go to graduate school, or to find a job. Either direction requires a new plan; a new roadmap! The direction you now take requires specialized tools to get there. Here are some steps you can take when you arrive at your destination:

Plan for Graduate School (see our Graduate School pages):