Do you know what your job goal is?
Taking the time now to reflect on your goal helps you to find a job that supports you financially, fits with your lifestyle, is a job you can maintain, and builds on your skills and abilities.
This section offers a brief overview of exploring your job goal, but is not about choosing a career path, which is a more complex decision.
The exercises in this section will help you to describe and more clearly define some of the specifics of your job goal. This work is often done best with a bit of help. Talk to an employment counsellor at The Working Centre as you work through this section.
The time you spend now in developing clarity on your job goal will help make the rest of your job search easier, and will help you to find a job more suited to you.
Here are some perspectives that help to shape job goals:
- Julia is looking for an environment where she can use her office skills, enjoy challenges, and learn new things, so she will target a fast-paced call centre environment in a large company where she has potential for advancement to other related office roles.
- John likes to use his welding skills in an environment where he can master one particular skill, enjoys doing the same task repeatedly, likes the wages he earns for his skill, and the larger environment where he uses this skill.
- Andrea was a pharmacist in Mexico, but is working on getting her licensing in Canada. In the mean-time she would like to work doing customer service in a pharmacy so she can maintain connection to her profession.
- Maria was willing to work hard but she worked for a larger insurance company where the high pressure environment was not to her liking – she decided to target a smaller company where she had more personal choice in her tasks and work hours.
Many of the exercises and ideas for this section are taken from What Colour is Your Parachute, by Richard Bolles. This book is widely available in bookstores or can be purchased through The Working Centre’s Books for Sustainable Living or at the Queen Street Commons Cafe.
