Category: - EPIC Career - Career Guidance, Consulting, Coach

Gap Year Hazards

5/3/2016

Brought to national attention in recent days by President Obama’s daughter's decision to delay Harvard admission by one year, arguments for high school graduates pursuing a Gap Year before college are quite compelling including developing greater understanding of career interests before settling on a college major. Having passed from the inherent pressure of compulsory education, exploring new or long stifled interests through travel, volunteer experience or generally non-academic pursuits seems like a logical step toward clarifying career goals, and generally healing oneself before embarking toward the college and career pursuit climb into adulthood. While all of this may be true, there are some definite potential hazards to consider before pursuing such a period of hopeful enlightenment.

1. Gap Programs Costs
If your going to do it, do it right - sign up for a Gap Year program. Often spanning a typical academic year and including international travel, these programs offer a wide array of opportunities for personal enrichment, new skill development and volunteering experience. While this arguably seems idyllic, be aware that although many offer possible financial assistance, these programs are typically quite expensive - some in the 10K - 20K range.

2. Missing a Year
While a Gap Year may be invigorating, you could earn a year of college credits while at the same time potentially discovering the same or more about yourself through the college experience. You could have even prepared yourself for a far less expensive upcoming study-abroad experience from which you could further earn college credit.

3. A Simpler Alternative
Perhaps not seemingly as exciting, a simple career assessment and a few hours of consultation would likely offer you as much or more self insight to help you shape your career interests into confidently-made decisions. Fulfilling as world travel may be, career assessment and consultation can help you simply see how everything you enjoy relates to the career world so that you can begin constructing a unique strategy for your long- term career success.

Don't get me wrong, everything about a Gap Year sounds wonderful. How could anyone argue with the advantages of exploring the world, helping others, and developing diverse friendships from such an experience. My argument is simply that for those for whom such an experience is financially impractical, great benefit can be gained from a far less costly and timely career assessment and consultation experience. If you are ready to extinguish the anxiety of your career indecision and begin creating a plan with the highest likelihood of long-term career success, EPIC Career is here to help.

career assessments myth #1: i know what i am doing so i have no need for career assessment

7/29/2014

Myth 1: I know what I am doing, so I have no need for career assessment.

False!

Are you sure about jumping into that career field? From my experience working with clients about career and college major choice issues, I can often fairly quickly see how a career choice might or might not be a long-term career fit. Actually, sometimes it is a great fit and I breathe a huge sigh of relief. But far too often, I know that the choice is a terrible mistake.

Why does it bother me to learn that someone is about to embark upon a career from which they are not likely to find long-term satisfaction? First, I think about their future disenchantment with the choice and what a blow to their future self-confidence it will be. Secondly, I think of all of the resources (time, energy, tuition and certification expenses) the individual will personally invest. Finally, I hate to think that the American taxpayers are about to potentially loan that student tens of thousands of dollars to pursue a program that might only lead to disappointment.

So when I hear "This program has great job prospects" or "I have a friend who did that program and everything turned out great for them," my response is "Are you sure that you are completely confident about spending or borrowing all those many thousands of dollars on this program that you are not quite entirely sure will work for you?" Are you sure you don't want to know what more than 60 years of solid research suggests would be highly likely to be an ideal fit for you?"

Before spending all those thousands, wouldn't it be wise to explore a wider set of options that will offer you understanding of clear pathways for your future career success? Whatever your college major or career decisions, wouldn't this knowledge help you breathe easier as you make them? At EPIC Career, we are here to help.

Career Assessments Myth #2: Happy In My Career So Don't Need It

7/21/2014

Myth 2: Because I am happy in my career, career assessments could in no way help me advance in my career.

False!

Making the Case

Career success is wonderful! It is great when you enjoy your career and earn a salary that meets your needs. It's even better to feel you have earned appropriate credentials for your profession and strong references that will support many years of career advancement. My question is: do you know how to articulate your strengths? Yes, past achievements, educational attainment, and references speak for themselves, but is that your whole story?

If you have ever been a hiring manager you know the conundrum. You have gone through all the appropriate interviews, checked all the references (which were all satisfactory), and involved all the appropriate people with whom the new hire might regularly work. But ultimately, the final decision still lies solely with you. How do you make the decision? What is the ultimate rationale that will help you decide that one applicant will truly be a better fit than any other candidate. The answer is "fit." You know that one candidate just fits in better with yourself or others and you think (often with no rational explanation) that that one is better than every other candidate. As candidates, how can we be the fit?

Being the "Fit"

How do we stack the odds in our favor for the greatest chance of showing that we are the best fit? Personality! We must understand how our natural personality strengths make us the optimal fit for the job. When I have hired, I have always known that all applicants that I have invited to interview have a strong shot at the job. What I ultimately want to hear, however, is what makes the candidates tick. What excites them at work? What successes have they enjoyed enacting that they describe as satisfying? I also want to hear about what is not so fun or not so interesting and how that applicant manages those tasks. These details are what make the applicant a human. After all, if I am hiring them, I want to know that I want to hang out with them in the workplace for a significant amount of time over many years. Personally, I do not want to hear about how they like to go fishing, skiing, shopping or anything else personal about their lives. I want to know about what they enjoy about work. Unfortunately, too often candidates do not convey this side of themselves, leaving the interviewer to only speculate about job fit as the candidate made no compelling case.

The Power of Self-Description

How does a successful professional understand these kinds of intangible, difficult to measure qualities about themselves and most importantly, how does one articulate these qualities to an employer? Career assessment is the key. At EPIC Career, we help you understand how you have always been and will always be. Yes, we all change and improve in many ways throughout our lives, but there are many aspects of ourselves that are quite stable. You need to be able to describe in what ways you are uniquely gifted at particular work-related tasks - how you have been in the past and will always be. You can then use examples from your work experience to verify that success. This information is so much more than saying am a "I good team player". It's better than using generic terms like "focused", "punctual", or "dependable". (Shouldn't all workers be those things?!)

Are you ready to stand out from the crowd by describing yourself to employers in ways that most applicants cannot even conceptualize about themselves? At EPIC Career, we are here to help.

Career Assessments Myth #3: Only About Careers?

3/24/2014

Myth 3: The information revealed about yourself from a career assessment relates only to your career.

False!

Career Picture, Life Picture

It is often surprising to clients that our meetings reveal more to them about themselves than just career-related data. In the first hour or two of the consultation, we explain a couple of frameworks that help to explain basically how you are different from others. From this, you begin to learn not only about your unique ways of experiencing the world, but you also begin seeing aspects of yourself that you may have neglected because of any number of life circumstances. The goal is to help you see your natural talents and how they can be optimally applied to careers.

As we progress through this discussion, however, you may begin to understand how past experiences have shaped your everyday behaviors, both at work as well as your everyday life. Then, we begin the process of helping you fully comprehend what you truly enjoy in life and how your life may need to change in fundamental ways to achieve that happiness. While no one has an entirely ideal support system in place in their lives to help them move toward their ideals, from this discussion you may discover that you have more opportunities to make changes than you might have originally thought!

Yes, career choice is a personal, individual decision and we at EPIC Career are committed to helping you sort through the many aspects of your life to discover just how you can move toward your ideal career goals. Are your current career prospects weighing you down in ways that stifle potential happiness in the rest of your life? Are you ready to move forward in your career in ways that will move your entire life forward toward your ideals? At EPIC Career, we are here to help.

Career Assessments Myth #4: Individual Choice?

3/21/2014

Myth 4: You must choose one of the professions listed on a career assessment to achieve career success.

False!

Your Career Fit

Consultation with career assessments includes discussion of a wide range of facets of the client’s personality including their preferred ways of understanding new information, decision making and organizing their environments. Once we reach the point in the discussion of considering a career focus, clients have unearthed a new, expanded perspective about their innate talents and skills that they most enjoy using. By this point, clients have often developed an understanding of what professions would likely prove to be a strong fit for them and, of those, which specifically they might want to pursue. If they have not, the professional titles are available from the assessments. We then review commonalities across the professions to gain a picture of the main elements of a career that would be optimal for the client.

Career choice is a personal decision and the fit is as unique as each individual. Whether they move forward with a profession listed on the assessments or not, from this discussion, an individual career plan emerges.

Do you feel like you go to work each day without excitement or passion? Do you seek a job that you will enjoy and a career that you can foresee enjoying throughout the long term? At EPIC Career, we are here to help.

Career Change or Career Reframe?

3/12/2014

Client Question: I've felt dissatisfied for a while now in my career, but I'm not sure that I want to resign and go back to school, either. I feel stuck. Any advice?

EPIC Career Answer: This may surprise you - you could be in the right place already without knowing it. Yes, many of my adult clients embark upon major life changes as a result of my consultations with them. Typically, they begin college courses or start networking toward new career fields. However, I am amazed at how many of my clients do not change jobs. These non-job changers usually have one thing in common: they did not know that they had made many wise career-related decisions already.

Career Rut

Often, the aspects of their jobs that they dislike have been glaring at them for so long that they have forgotten about the positive aspects. These individuals are often highly successful in their careers. What they hadn’t considered much lately are the many decisions throughout their lives that led them to where they are today. These decisions are not mistakes; rather, they have led to many real, positive results.

Once we examine their career assessment results together, they often begin to see their background in a more realistic light. While their results often describe job titles that they had never before considered, they also include valuable information like the client's preferred work environments, learning style, leadership style and other information. These data help them organize their past career decision-making into a sequence of events that have allowed them to develop many of their innate talents and successfully adapt their weaknesses.

Same Career, Different Perspective

The conversation then shifts from "How can I get out of this job?" to "How can I adapt my behavior at work such that I continue to be successful, but also feel fulfilled in other aspects of my life?" We will then likely examine the ways in which changing a few basic habits in the course of a normal workday can go a long way toward building a new perspective about their current jobs. It can also help them see how they might pursue new non-work related interests that may help develop the whole person, beyond just their identity at work.

Are you feeling unsure about your career choices of the past? Do you feel stuck in a career that you dread potentially spending the rest of your life pursuing? Do you think you have potential for success in your current job field, but need some help figuring out how to make it more satisfying? If so, at EPIC Career we are here to help.

The Top 5 Myths about Career Assessments

3/11/2014

For the next several posts, I will be counting down the top 5 myths individuals I’ve worked with tend to believe about career assessments. Stay tuned for the complete list!

Myth 5: Assessments like the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator® (MBTI®) and Strong Interest Inventory® generate 100% flawless results.

False!

So how can I vouch for them as a career consultant? The answer is that these assessments, including the MBTI are not intended to be used without the guidance of an experienced practitioner. Unlike a medical test, for example, that confirms whether a patient is carrying a certain virus, psychological instruments point to general tendencies. They are not designed to be provide a diagnosis! Rather, the responses on the instrument can serve as a lens through which to understand the client. I also advise clients to try to answer as though they are living in an “ideal world” to try to prevent responses that are provided because the client thinks that s/he “should” answer a particular way.

A Personal Example

For example, my wife took the MBTI as part of a requirement in a college course. When the professor scored the assessment and gave each student his/her profile, my wife did not recognize herself on the description. Then, the professor placed students into groups with their similar “type” so that they could find commonalities amongst each other. Again, my wife felt like a fish out of water in this group. For this reason, she did not hold much faith in the MBTI assessment at all.

Years later, she re-took the exam. This time, however, she tried to answer with the “ideal world” framework in mind. It revealed that one critical point of her prior results were inaccurate. With this correction, her entire profile changed, revealing a profile with which she really identified. It was a genuine “Eureka!” kind of moment. With these new results, she better understood why her current field of study and career prospects were not such a good fit.

Understanding Inaccurate Results

So why were her first results so skewed? That is a complicated answer, and it points to why it is so necessary to discuss results with an experienced practitioner. In her case, Western culture tends to exalt certain preferences – like logic, hard science, and rationality – above other preferences, such as empathy, cooperation, and emotion. When she answered the assessment the first time, it became clear that she was answering what she considered the right, university-approved kind of answers should be. She knew those initial answers did not reflect how she saw herself, but she blamed the instrument, rather than the way in which the assessment was administered.

This case is actually common. My goal for each client is to help him or her see how our world needs people who embody all of these types, despite what our culture tends to reinforce. In sum, no career assessment is intended to be fool-proof. Take your raw results as a starting point for a rich discussion about yourself. At EPIC Career, we are here to help.

Helping the Teen or the Parent?

3/11/2014

I started career consulting wishing to use my career assessment and higher education leadership background to help individuals make a career plan. What I did not expect, however, is the impact my work with teens would have on their relationships with their parents. I have been amazed at how parents and teens have revealed that in addition to helping the teen develop well-formed career goals, the service has enhanced their mutual understanding of one another.

Parent Perspective

Based on assessment results, parents report improvement in how they interpret the personality proclivities of their teen after consultation. Specifically, they see how the unique talents and interests of the teen can translate into a significant career. They often report that they have wondered how their teen would adapt to the adult and work world. After consultation they understand the root of their teen’s behaviors and how their teen has already made adaptations in his/her life to overcome weaknesses. Upon reviewing this history, it becomes clear to parents that their teen is highly likely to continue successfully using their strengths and adapting for weaknesses in the same way throughout his/her life. When reviewing career roles typical of others like their teen from assessments based on decades of research, they also see how their teen is likely to act successfully throughout his/her future. Both teens and parents seem quite relieved to gain this insight.

Beyond Just College Major Choice

While I started career consulting with the main purpose of helping clients build focus around a career that they will love, I have found that the insight gained from career assessments has yielded enhanced understanding and communication among parents and teens. As a parent, have you felt unsure about how your teen’s interests, skills and overall personality could lead to college and career success? Have you worried about whether your teen will ever discover career success because you feel some of his/her behaviors or past decisions illuminate a future trend resulting in your teen being too unusual to “fit in?” At EPIC Career, our gold standard career assessments will reveal exactly how your teen’s responses relate to responses of individuals who have reported success in particular career fields. In addition, we help you better understand your teen such that a lifetime of success in particular career fields becomes clear. If you seek this level of insight about your teen, we at EPIC Career are here to help.

College Major Choice: Why Music?

2/28/2014

The short answer, the long answer and the only answer is, “because I didn’t know what else to do.” In seventh grade, I was 7th chair of 8 trombonists. I was overweight, made poor grades, had very crooked teeth, crazy hair, few friends and very low self-esteem. Yes, I suppose many could say that they felt similarly awkward in middle school, but my day came.

One Friday when the band director said learn and memorize as many scales as possible and be able to play them on command by Monday morning, for some reason, I decided I was on a mission. The directive just didn’t seem difficult to me. I thought, “well, all I have to do is simply practice over and over until I got them.” I knew I only had to commit one weekend so I thought, “why not - let’s go for it.”

That Monday morning when I started playing all manner of exotic scales in perfect consistent tempo at 2 and 3 octaves from my practically bloody lips, I won first chair. I had never before won anything. I was not going to give up that high. I think one of my best friends beat me a couple of times on those weekly chair tests, but for the most part I remained 1st chair until I graduated high school. I played in concert band, orchestra and jazz groups and won many of the standard competitions for which many other middle and high school students competed.

It was fun and it was what I could do. So when college time came along, what else was I to do but study music. Everyone I knew assumed that this was what I would do. When schools around my state started offering me scholarships, I assumed that this was what I should do.

College Years: Not Quite as Rosy

I came into college with similar musical experience and ability as my peers. Suddenly the nerves set in. During these years, every time I auditioned for a college ensemble, I choked. Though I would practice tons in preparation for these auditions such that I could practically always perform each excerpt requested from memory, the tone that was generated from the tightening of my throat sounded wobbly and shaky. Naturally, this also made everything else about my performance suffer. Why couldn’t I just go with the flow like I did in practice and just enjoy playing the music? I guess I will never know the answer to that one. I have deliberated for years, but can never figure it out. Perhaps it was because while I experienced often weekly chair tests in high school and multiple other competitions (if I blew it I always knew there would soon be another one), placements for positions in the best ensembles in college were usually made only annually. Needless to say this performance hindrance killed my then dream of a career in music.

A New Career Path

The parting of the private lesson instructor with whom I had studied for 4 years as an undergraduate impacted me greatly. When he gathered all of his students in his studio to inform us that he had accepted a faculty position at another university it set off a flare inside me. It was then that I started realizing just what all I had learned from that man. Both from direct instruction and simply from the modeling of his ever-professional behavior, I learned how to manage my time, communicate with others professionally and respectfully, balance the many pressures of practice, rehearsals, free time, rest, etc. When I realized just how much I had learned from him, I realized not only why his parting impacted me so strongly, but also what I wanted to do with the rest of my life. The answer soon became entirely clear.

I happened upon a man at the same university who managed a master’s program in higher education administration and I thought it sounded fascinating. To study how colleges work in preparation for a job wherein you assist college students (e.g., admissions, residence life, student activities, advising/counseling) sounded like preparation to assist others as my private lesson instructor had. This sounded ideal. I studied with many retired college presidents and learned how things worked in various types of colleges and universities.

When I later accepted my first job out of my master’s degree as a university career counselor, I was not thrilled about having to take a career assessment myself and the idea of using these assessments with students to help them decide about a college major and career choice. When I completed the assessments and discovered how much insight they revealed about me, I was blown away. The results indicated that I and others like me (who were a very small percentage of the U.S.) were natural counselors. The results included a long list of helping professions like clergy, psychologist, professor, etc.

At that time I looked back at my many years struggling to figure out what I should do with my life. I thought that had I known this information before, I might not have chosen music. I realized, however, that most of the helping professions listed required a graduate degree and that the undergraduate degree area mattered not. So my bachelor’s degree major could have been in anything. While I realized that I had not spent time or resources on a degree that would not lead me to my next goals, I was very pleased to learn of the results.

As I realized I was preparing for a life working in a college, I thought it logical to study a bit about how we learn, so I completed my doctorate in Education. As I studied the history of formal education throughout the world, and all sorts of ways to measure learning, I focused on career assessment. I studied theories about how we develop throughout our lives in terms of career, differences in men’s and women’s career issues, and how to assist clients in making sense of career assessment results.

After career counseling for a few years, I spent many years teaching psychology, as a department chair, dean, and then campus director. While I greatly enjoyed academic administration, the issue that bothered me most was about career guidance. As I would attend professional meetings of senior college administrators, the issue always arose of how to let the citizenry know of the opportunities available to them via their colleges and universities. Also, everyone wanted to know how to retain students through graduation and ensure that they secured gainful employment for a satisfying career afterward. Increasingly, it occurred to me that budget constraints and the sheer volume of individuals needing career guidance were likely to continue to impede colleges and universities from offering the level of support that anyone entering college or considering a career change needed. This is why EPIC Career was born. I thought it only made sense to use my background in higher education administration and expertise about career assessment directly to individuals who seek it.

Have you likewise experienced confusion about your career path? Have you wondered if there is a career that would be a better fit than the one that you are currently focused on? If so, seek career guidance. At EPIC Career, we are here to help.

Why Are They So Good at That?

1/27/2014

Why are they so good at that? We ask this question a lot, and the underlying reason for these comparisons is problematic. I often find that my clients have one attribute in common: they feel unusual. They explain that their lives have been based in constantly struggling to figure out how to embody the same strengths as others. It makes sense that they would feel this way; after all, our education system steers all toward achievement of the same academic standard in lockstep fashion. This one-size-fits-all mentality only exacerbates the message to those who feel unusual.

The “Big Three” Problem Areas

I find that individuals tend to report three main problem areas: communication, mathematics, and organizational skills. Many of my clients report that they have difficulty communicating, whether through organizing their thoughts or generally are fearful of approaching someone to engage in a casual conversation. Others report that math skills do not come naturally, and that math has hindered their educational advancement. Still others struggle with organization – they prefer to move from task to task in a flexible, spontaneous fashion. Yet these are skills that a cookie-cutter approach to education takes for granted.

What To Do?

The good news is that if you feel likewise bothered by any of these issues, there is a place for you. Assessments like those offered via EPIC Career can show you exactly what career fields are common for individuals of any number of the above personality traits. I strongly believe that we must begin working with our natural talents and strengths, rather than making fruitless comparisons.

What I most love about working with clients is showing them professions that prize their personality traits and wherein others have long reported career success and satisfaction. I then use my background in higher education administration to show them how to navigate colleges and universities toward helping them create a workable plan to achieve their new career goals in a way that fits their life circumstances. If you ever have any doubt about whether a possible career choice is likely to be a strong fit for you in the long term, seek assistance. At EPIC Career, we are here to help.