This past week I had the opportunity to speak to about 70 parents at a private college prep high school.  The anxiety level in the room was moderately high because these parents were there to hear answers about how to get their students to take seriously the process of finding a career path and choosing a college to attend.

Earlier this fall, I wrote an entry on anxiety – understanding it and strategies for managing it, so I won’t repeat those principles here.  But I had a number of parents comment afterwards that limiting the amount of future they think about was a helpful concept to them.

I continue to “preach” the concept that a student’s career path is the combination of understanding themselves (their abilities, interests, personality style, etc.) and knowledge about the world of work. And I fully believe that we continually overemphasize the individual aspect of the equation. In fact, (although it is a bit of an over-statement) I have come to believe that it really doesn’t matter what a student wants to do.  Ask anyone one of the tens of thousands of individuals who have been laid off, furloughed or who can’t find work.

The issue isn’t “what do I want to do” but “what goods or services are needed that people are willing to pay for“?   As a culture, we have forgotten that the primary purpose of a career is to provide financially for ourselves and our family.  This is accomplished by providing a service (either customers or an employer) that someone needs and is willing to pay for — and obviously, that we are qualified to provide.

There are thousands of people who right now aren’t working in their primary career field.  They aren’t doing what they went to college to study.  But they have their current job because “it pays the bills”.  This is a reality that many young people don’t fully understand  (or haven’t until recently).

So, the point is:  young people today need to focus more on learning about the world of work, and less on what they are interested in doing.  (Hopefully, they will find a career path that meets this desire, but it is the secondary issue.)  They need to find out “what is out there” — what jobs and careers exist, what do you really do in them, and what the current and future needs are.

To press the point further, it isn’t that helpful to know that you are good with numbers, like animals, are introverted, and have the resources to go to college if you don’t know what career paths match these characteristics, what course of study is needed, and what the needs are for the future.

So how does a student learn about the world of work? Being blunt — by working.  Not by taking “Introduction to [Psychology, Veterinary Science, Computer Science, Elementary Education, insert your area of interest here]”.  Not by going to a lot of fun camps.  Not by playing sports all summer, every summer from junior high through high school.   I have written previously on the importance of work experience for college graduates seeking employment.  And after my presentation this past week, I had a large number of business owners and managers approach me, saying, “That part about students needing to work — I couldn’t agree with you more.  Keep saying it.”

There are lots of opportunities for students to learn about the world of work:  part-time jobs, summer jobs, shadowing, interviewing professionals, talking to college professors in your area of interest, talking to older friends (say, friends of your older sibling) about their experiences, and volunteering.

Generally speaking, I think parents should focus less on SAT & ACT prep courses (although they can make a big difference in scholarship awards) and more on their students getting some work experience.  Getting into the college of your choice doesn’t matter much if you don’t have a clue what you are going to study.  After all, we do know what academic success predicts, don’t we?  Academic success at the next level.  Academic success, in itself, has little predictive validity for career success. (There are a lot of successful students who don’t learn the skills necessary to succeed in the world of work — a topic for another entry sometime.)

Why am I “hammering” this issue of work so hard?  Because I am seeing lots and lots of young adults who were great kids and teens, who did well in school, had fun in high school (and college), who didn’t work much — and who are virtually lost in their career direction because they don’t know what is “out there” in the world of work, and they don’t know how to find out.

Hopefully, my message will help you and your student avoid this unpleasant pathway.  If I can be of help, let me know.  I am doing more and more career coaching for young adults to help them find out what is “out there” and develop a plan to figure out their career path (many of these are long distance, by telephone or video conference.)

Have a good week!

Recently, the reality of people losing their jobs has been hitting quite close to home.  Living in the city where most aircraft are built in the U.S., and the struggles aircraft manufacturers are experiencing have made knowing individuals who have been laid off from work a personal experience.  And the secondary job losses are significant as well — suppliers to the aircraft manufacturers, graphic designers, retail sales, professionals in the real estate arena — all are experiencing the effects.

I am reticent to personally give advice to individuals who are walking on paths I have not had to walk yet.  However, I did find the following ideas in some recent articles, and thought they might be of some help.

Given the current financial crisis, Psychology Today decided to interview a number of successful professionals and find out the role that “failure” played in their personal and professional development.  Here are a few of the comments and findings:

• There is a difference between failures and Failure, just like the difference that exists between financial diminshment and bankruptcy, and marital strife / divorce.
• Failure hurts but can pay off in the form of learning, growth, and wisdom.  Some psychologists … go even further, arguing that adversity, setbacks, and even trauma actually may be necessary for people to be happy, successful and fulfilled.
• J.K. Rowling, author of the Harry Potter series of books experienced a series of failures including a broken marriage, and poverty that bordered on homelessness.  She states:  “Failure stripped away everything inessential.  It taught me things about myself I could have learned no other way.”
• Paul MacCready, Jr., a famous aeronautical engineer who won the Kremer Prize for the world’s first human-powered airplane, depended on failure to help him succeed.  He designed his airplane to crash well, so that it would protect the pilot and the plane could be quickly repaired, so he could learn quickly from his failures.
• The difference between people who come out of failure successfully and those who do not seems to be related to the degree of ‘rumination’ that is allowed to continue.  “Failing better” is related to three aspects: controlling our emotions, adjusting our thinking, and recalibrating our beliefs about ourselves and what we can do in the world.
• Many argue that failure is necessary for growth.  So protecting ourselves (or our children) from failure limits our exposure to growth opportunities.  Conversely, too much failure can discourage and lead to one’s spirit being crushed — to the point of giving up.  How much failure is too much?  Two really helpful answers (being sarcastic):  “It depends” (on the stage of life and unique characteristics of the individual; and “We don’t really know.”

From a companion article, here are “Nine ways to fail better” by Bruce Grierson.

1. Lighten up — have a sense of humor.
2. Join the club — commiserate with others in similar situations.
3. Feel guilt, not shame — learn from your mistakes,but don’t accept the belief that “I am a failure”.
4. Cultivate optimism — put yor negative thoughts on trial and rebut them; they often are not based in reality.
5. Ask not what the world can do for you . . .  –  you now have the opportunity to do something different with your life.
6. Scale down your expectations for yourself — repeatedly failing to meet your expectations for yourself may indicate you need to re-evaluate realistic expectations for yourself.
7. Keep a journal, learn from what you are thinking and feeling, and use those lessons to take action.
8. Don’t blame yourself — blaming yourself for the bad things that happen to you (i.e. attributing all cause to yourself) is an error in thinking that causes people to become stuck, rather than to become stuck, rather than moving forward.
9. Act! — failure provides an opportunity to do something different, but only if you act on the opportunity.

I hope some of these thoughts may be helpful to you — or forward them to a friend or family member you know who finds themselves in this difficult situation.