by Dustin (bio)
NOTE: This is the third installment in a series of posts that piece together things I've learned over the last eight years of using my life like a lab rat to figure out the question "what should I do with my life?" This series is aimed at those who are exploring career, looking to change jobs, or who are simply searching for more happiness in their daily work regardless of what that work entails. Read Part 1 or Part 2.
Yesterday I ate lunch with a friend and we were talking about what in the world drove him to major in bio-engineering. He said he showed up at Rice University and asked around to find out what the hardest major was and then signed up for that. He's obviously driven by different values than I am. Pretty much any hard class or major I ever came across at BYU-Idaho got the ol' "sayonara." But he illustrates an interesting point: People land in majors and careers for really random reasons. You might be able to relate. I know I can.
I chose public relations as a sophomore because I met with a career counselor who asked me what I like to do and I said "work with people" (just like virtually every other human being on planet earth). He said, "Do you feel like you can relate well with them?" I thought about it and said, "Oh yeah. Actually I do that really well." "Then you should go into public relations," was the reply. So I went into PR. The joke was on me when two years later I was gainfully employed at a top-tier PR firm in Dallas sitting in a "call booth" cold-calling media from wellness magazines to pitch them my client, Beano, and it's discovery of Complex Carbohydrate Intolerance (aka stinky toots). Choosing a major or career is tricky because we don't know how to approach it and our default strategy is random.
From what I have observed over the past ten years, there are really two ways to go about choosing your career path, the
Outside/In Model or the
Inside/Out Model (trademark pending for the super creative names). Most people choose this one:
Outside/In Model
You begin your career search by looking at all of the options "out there" and then fitting yourself into the one that most peaks your interest. You use what I call
Outside/In Model, looking at what is available and then deciding if you fit in one of those options. From the 200+ individuals I've interviewed, the consensus is that most people choose a major or career based on at least one of the following:
- My dad was a _____ so I will be too (as if career is consistently passed through the blood line).
- XYZ career path pays really well so I'll do that.
- XYZ major only takes _____ credits to graduate. Let's do this!
- I really liked studying the Renaissance in high school, so I'll be an English major.
- I loved Mr. Jones, my high school math teacher. He changed my life. I'll be a math major.
- My parents are paying for my schooling and they said, "We're not paying for you to go to ABC school to get a degree in that!"
In other words, when people choose a major they typically follow a relatively arbitrary and ineffective model of looking at all of the options they perceive to be available to them "out there" and then fitting themselves into one of them, much like fitting a round peg into a square hole. A graduating college senior might say, "Well, I can go into teaching, consulting, or pursue graduate school," pick one, and go with it. I did this when I graduated and most of the individuals I career coach do a similar thing. When I graduated with a degree in public relations my first Google search was for "jobs" in "public relations" in "Dallas." Likewise, when I initially selected my major I chose it based on super limited information. There are really three problems with this method:
1. It takes a lot of time to find a job you love. The common refrain is, "You can do anything for a year." While this is true, and I've definitely had my fair share of one-year jobs, an accumulation of one-year positions over a career can be detrimental because you may never get very much depth in any one career. You may select a major or career path, try it out for a year, bail and move on the next, try it for a year, and so on. People say, "Just dive in. You'll figure it out." While true, it's also very time-consuming and frustrating.