Know yourself (transcription)
If you're not sure where your postgrad course will lead you, how do you explore your options?
It's important to start with understanding yourself. What are your strengths, your achievements, what do you enjoy doing and what motivates you?
Knowing yourself first, can better help you understand which companies and which types of jobs are going to be the best fit for you.
That process should include an audit of your skills and, in particular, your communication, teamwork, and leadership skills.
No matter how strong you are technically, or how high your GPA is, the ability to be not just good, but an outstanding communicator will open many doors and career options, and an extension of that would be your leadership skills.
How good are you at motivating a team, inspiring others to take action, and bringing out the best in people?
At UTS Careers we have various career assessments available that can help you better understand what you would be most suited to.
We use the 'Career Voyage' career profiling tool which will identify your preferences and then suggest a range of career options for you to explore. We also have several personality and strength assessments that help you find out how you might behave in certain work environments and highlighting traits that you need to be aware of.
For example, if you identify someone with introverted traits, you may need to consider carefully how you'll perform in a role that requires selling or presenting regularly.
It's not that you won't be able to perform in that role or learn those skills, but it may be pushing you outside of your comfort zone too much, and will that role be sustainable and rewarding for you over a longer period of time.
These tools can be found via the Career Hub student portal.
You just need to search for 'Career Assessments' or speak to our recruitment team down in the Careers Drop-in centre.
And the next step in exploring those career options, once you do know yourself, is to look at what opportunities exist out there. Websites like 'Job Outlook', 'My Health Career', 'Graduate Opportunities', 'Grad Careers Australia'. Those are just a few of them, but there's a huge amount of information describing what certain jobs do, the demand for people to fill those roles, and the salary and employment prospects.
But nothing can beat looking at the live job descriptions that exist by searching roles on job websites and getting to understand the key responsibilities and expectations within those roles.
In the process of reviewing live job descriptions, it's particularly important to look at the essential and desirable criteria to be eligible for that role. Does that description sound like you? Does it match your skills? What are the gaps that you need to work on in the meantime?