If you have an idea about what kind of work you want to do, you have a great start on building your next career. But first you need to learn more, either to confirm your choices or to find the flaws in your reasoning before going too far.
Career research can be fun, exciting, discouraging, misleading ... and time-consuming. Depending on the depth of your research, you'll need to set aside anywhere from a few days to a few months to ensure you come to the right conclusion.
But, first, a word about the discouraging and misleading parts. Career explorers become discouraged when they learn that a career may take more training, may pay less or may offer fewer job opportunities than they expected or hoped.
This makes sense. If you had wanted a quicker or more profitable path, of course contradicting information will take the wind out of your sails. It's also a good reality check: If a particular choice won't work for you, it's better to learn that early on.
That said, I encourage you to take all discouraging information with a grain of salt, especially in the early stages of exploration. It's far too easy to believe the perspective offered by one person or one book and then walk away from what might have been a good career choice. We get two estimates on car repairs and house painting, but we often decline to get a second opinion when it comes to hopes and dreams.
In particular, I'm concerned that many sources of career information emphasize the need for college degrees in fields in which the employers actually are willing to hire people with fewer educational credentials. If you believe the career Web sites or books without talking directly to employers, you might lose out on a good option.
One way to ensure you're getting good information is to vary the methods of research.
I like to think of career research as an inverted triangle cut into three layers. The top layer, which is the widest, represents the information that is most easily found and that covers the broadest territory.
For example, suppose you were interested in a career as a technical writer. You might start your research by looking up the job and its duties on a career-based Web site or in a reference book. There you would learn some general things, such as the work that technical writers commonly do, the median salary nationwide in the last few years and the educational background necessary.
At this stage, you would have a general idea but not nearly enough to make a decision.
You need to move to the next level of the research triangle. This is when you start talking with people in the field, including, in this case, technical writers, employers and the professional associations that serve this profession.
This level of research is far more time-consuming than the first level, because it requires you to contact individuals and ask them questions. For that reason, it is also more difficult.
In addition to demanding the social skills to call strangers and ask for advice, this stage brings the career explorer to a new level of commitment. Now you're telling other people your dream, and you're getting more attached to it yourself.
The risk will pay off if you get the encouragement necessary to move forward. In this stage of research, ask all kinds of "How can I?" questions. For example, "How can I get a start in this field if I don't have a degree in technical writing?"
The last level of research, the point of the triangle, is personal information-gathering. This is about getting the answers that only you can provide to questions such as "Do I enjoy doing this work?" and "Do I have at least the basic level of skills an employer would require?"
One good way to find these answers is by trying the work on for size. In most fields, you can do this through some combination of classes, internships, apprenticeships, contract work or volunteer work.
One advantage of this stage of research is that you are building marketable experience while ironing out your own reactions to the work. The contacts you make at this stage will become your references as you move into the job search.
-- Amy Lindgren owns Prototype Career Service, a career consulting firm in St. Paul, Minn. She can be reached at alindgren@prototypecareerservice.com or at 1071 W. Seventh St., St. Paul, MN 55102.