These Seven Steps Can Help You Land the Right Job

You are not alone in your desire to make the big switch to a fulfilling and thrilling job or ensure that your first one is a step toward a lifetime career.

The road to discovering your dream job, especially if you don’t even know what it is, is far from being straight and narrow. You may have to spend years in a role before you realize that it isn’t working. What this means is you have to retrace your steps and go back to square one where rounds of preemployment tests await.

Take drug testing, for example. Not all employers require this procedure, but it’s not uncommon to submit to one when you move to another company. You can only take all necessary measures to pass a drug test and take the opportunity to change the course of your life as in the following steps.

Get to Know Your Strengths, Skills, and Interests

Sit down and have an honest review of what you can do and want to do. Start with skills that you have learned and developed over the years at work and outside it. Who you are, your motivations, and your interests have a significant impact on your career choices. Indeed, your personality dictates how you handle situations, especially in jobs where stress and cut-throat competition are mainstays. Your propensity to learn and relearn matters when you venture out of your comfort zone.

A note about passion: it pays that you are passionate about something, but the right career sometimes goes beyond that. You will have a more grounded decision if you consider all factors to see the bigger picture.

Write Down Your Ideal Workplace

You may have worked long enough to come up with a list of things you want to see in your future career. These preferences can center on what makes work enjoyable and worthwhile. You also look into your definition of a pleasant working environment and people you want as coworkers and bosses. Ultimately, these characteristics form the basis of staying in a company or moving along to a new one.

Find Common Ground

In the course of your right job search, you will come across many questions, such as these:

• What are your strengths?
• What are the needs of companies?
• What are your interests?

The answers you have probably known, but it is discovering the overlap that will clarify some things for you.

Meet People Who Have Found Their Dream Job

Get in touch with folks who have been in your shoes and have done that successfully. Social media is filled with people who made a drastic move in their career and found their life’s work as in the saying “Find a job that you will love, and you will never have to work.” You can learn from their experience and apply these lessons to your endeavor. Interacting with this group can lead you to a mentor to help you out.

Network and Feel the Industry Pulse

Expand your social circle by making friends with people working in various industries. If you’ve been eyeing an advertising role, for example, catch up with an acquaintance who works in that field. Firsthand knowledge about the demands, challenges, and inner workings of their jobs can level your expectations and prepare you for what’s to come.

Think before You Readily Say Yes or No

A friend informed you about a job opening in her company. Reserve your knee-jerk reaction, and refrain from saying yes or no until you have seen the details of the job. Ask questions. Maybe the nitty-gritty aspects of the work will pique your interest. If they don’t, you can actively look up job listings online.

Take a Career Assessment

It is an impartial way to help you find the right job that matches your personality and passion, as well as skills and strengths. But for this tool to be effective, it has to yield consistent results despite retakes and measure what it is supposed to do.

Career tests differ by the factors they cover; some are free, while others require payment. Whichever quiz you want to take, as long as they are reliable and valid, make the most of the insights to steer you in the right direction.

Important to Note

There’s no correct formula to resolve existential and practical matters of life. But you may do well to consider these pointers should the question “What is the right career for me?” arise. As a matter of practicality, don’t quit your job until you are ready to switch and explore your options.

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