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HOW TO FIND WORK YOU LOVE TO DO by Kevin Brennfleck and Kay Marie Brennfleck National Certified Career Counselors
Are you dissatisfied with your job? Are you at a career crossroads, not sure whether to continue in the same job or to make a change to a new job or career? Are you currently in school, feeling uncertain about how to choose a career that you will find interesting and fulfilling? Are you concerned that you will soon be "downsized" at your company? Are you feeling anxious and confused about what to do? Are you grappling with knowing what God wants you to do with your career and life? Has the Lord been at work within you in a new way? Are you are feeling an emerging desire to serve Him in new ways through your work, but the specific direction is not yet clear to you? If you are experiencing situations similar to the above, you are not alone! To live is to grow and change, and nowhere is that more evident these days than in the world of work. We are living in a time of transition and change. Approximately ten percent of the U.S. workforce changes jobs or careers each year--in a recent year that meant that ten million workers went through the career/job change process! A season of career change can be triggered by external events such as being laid off, moving to a new city, finishing an educational program, getting married or divorced, having a baby, starting school or leaving home. Internal "nudges" can also compel you to contemplate making a job change: perhaps you feel unfulfilled or dissatisfied by work you previously enjoyed, maybe you have "outgrown" your job and now feel underemployed or under utilized, or perhaps you have experienced significant spiritual growth, resulting in a change in your outlook, goals and values. Although making career/job changes is something most people will experience 8-10 times during their lives, most people do not know how to choose a career direction effectively. The majority of people do not make an actual career choice; rather, they let circumstances or other people dictate their path. For example, when we meet with someone new in our career counseling practice, our clients often describe "falling into" their job or career path: "Uncle Joe told me about an opening at his company, and I've been there ever since" or "My friend was majoring in accounting, so I decided to become an accountant" or "I was skimming the classified ads, this job caught my eye, they offered it to me and so I took it even though I didn't know much about the job or the company." Letting other people or circumstances direct one's course often results in taking the path of least resistance, which usually leads to one or more of the following outcomes:
So what is the alternative? Proactively PLANNING your career and life! Most people spend more time planning their vacations than they do planning their careers and lives! Why? Usually it is because they either don't see the need to be invest time and energy in career planning, or they just don't know how to go about it. (Our schools, universities and seminaries haven't done a very good job, unfortunately, of teaching people how to chart a course for their careers and lives.) Taking responsibility for and learning how to plan your career optimizes your potential to produce these outcomes in your life:
In our career counseling private practice, we guide our clients through a process we call "Career Master Planning." As we use the term, "master planning" means developing a plan that gives overall guidance in your career and life; and, it means that we, as Christians, should view career/life planning as a spiritual process in which we acknowledge that there is a Master (God) who is sovereign in our lives. As Proverbs 16:9 states, "In his heart a man plans his course, but the Lord determines his steps." Master planning means taking responsibility for planning your life while recognizing that the Lord is ultimately in charge. God. As Richard Bolles, the Christian author of What Color is Your Parachute? has written, "Pray, as though everything depended on God; then work, as though everything depended on you." Career success comes through working in partnership with God. Career Master Planning consists of four consecutive action stages. Each stage has specific questions to be addressed, as indicated below: Action Stage 1. Assessing My Design: Who am I? What is my God-given design? What do I enjoy doing, what do I value, what motivates me, what brings me a sense of fulfillment and meaning? What gifts and abilities has God given to me to use in this world? What needs, issues and/or causes do I find compelling and desire to address in my work? Action Stage 2. Exploring Careers: Which careers (or self-employment opportunities) potentially fit my design? Which would give me a sense of mission and purpose in my work? Action Stage 3. Making My Career Decision(s): Which option best fits my design (and other important criteria such as impact on family, salary needs, etc.)? Which best enables me to make a contribution to making this world a better place? In which do I believe I could serve God and others most effectively? Action Stage 4. Implementing My Decisions (Conducting a job search; gaining training/education; beginning self-employment, etc.): What are the necessary action steps to achieving my career dream/goal? How do I obtain a job in my chosen field? What are the best job search strategies to use? How do I best market myself? OR What are the best options for getting necessary training/education? OR What is the sequence of steps I need to take to successfully become self-employed? Career Master Planning is based on the belief that God has created you to be a unique individual, with a specific design of abilities and interests. His desire is for you to work out of your design; that is, find work that utilizes what you love to do. He wants you to experience the joy and satisfaction that comes from doing the work He created you to do. In so doing, you glorify Him. To work out of your design, however, you must know what it is. Therefore, you begin your master planning by discovering and/or deepening your understanding of your design through an assessment process which can include career tests, exercises, etc. Once you know the key pieces of your design--such as the skills you most want to use within work, the interests you are passionate about, the values that are critical to your sense of work satisfaction, the work factors that motivate you, etc.--you are then ready to explore possible options that fit your design. Exploration can include brainstorming strategies to identify and create options that would utilize your design, using written resources like The Occupational Outlook Handbook and The Dictionary of Occupational Titles, and conducting informational interviews with people who are doing the types of jobs you are interested in. Making a good career decision depends on three factors: 1) Having the right information about yourself; 2) Having the right information about the world of work; and, 3) Using good decision making strategies. Action stages 1 and 2 will provide you with the right information; your task in action stage 3 is to learn how to appropriately evaluate the information. Most people go with a "gut feel" about a job; sometimes this works out, but often it doesn't. Comparing options against key parts of your design, evaluating both the short-term and long-term pros and cons of options, and other strategies will help you make a well-thought through decision. Prayer certainly needs to be a part of the decision making process, but it doesn't replace our responsibility to develop maturity and wisdom in how we make life choices. Making a decision, however, is not enough. You must take action! And, to take effective action, you must have a plan. Many people do their "career planning" by seeing what is available in the classified ads, or sending out resumes, or enrolling in an educational program hoping that will help them to determine a direction. By now you can see how taking these types of actions, when the person has not completed action stages 1, 2 and 3 is really just gambling that their "choice" is going to be a good one. For most people action at some point also involves job search work. In job search activities there are two keys: finding job openings and proving that you can meet the employer's needs. In finding job openings, it's important to remember that at any given time only 15-20 % of the available jobs are going to be advertised. This includes the classified listings of the newspaper and the Internet. You will want to use these advertised resources to find job openings-- but only for perhaps 15-30% of your job search time. Ninety-five percent of job hunters delay their employment by using these advertised resources, especially the classified ads, as their number one method for finding job openings. As you can imagine the competition for these advertised jobs is intense. A key to finding job openings is to know that 85% of employers never advertise their job openings. Instead they fill positions with people they already know, people that are referred to them, or with individuals who just happen to contact them. These jobs are in what is called the "hidden" job market. The jobs are considered "hidden" because they are not advertised to the general public in any way. Seventy to 85% of your job search time should be devoted to tapping into the "hidden" job market. For more details related to this please read the informative article, Using Contacts to Get Into the Hidden Job Market . But it's not enough just to find job openings, you also need to prove that you are the right person to hire. You must show the employer how you can meet their needs better that anyone else they are considering. You can do this by polishing your communication skills that you will use in contacting employers, interviewing and salary negotiations. For more assistance in the interviewing process please read the artilcles Interviewing with Confidence, Effective Interviewing Do's and Dont's, and Frequently Asked Interview Questions Please look at the action steps listed above. Where do most people begin their career planning? That's right, action step four! Most people jump into a job search with little idea of what kind of work would be a good fit. They may only know that they want something that's different than what they have been doing. However, if they're sending out their resume that highlights the skills they've been using in the work they want to get away from, they may be highlighting all of their "KILLER SKILLS"! When a person has been in work that does not fit them well, they often have developed lots of "killer skills". Killer skills are skills that you can do competently, or even very well, but which you don't enjoy using. So, if you have a job that uses lots of these skills it will "kill" you at least emotionally, and sometimes even physically, as you are asked to use these skills on an ongoing basis. One research study found that the greatest predictor of longevity in our country is the degree of work satisfaction a person experiences in his or her job. So when we talk about "killer skills", we are literally talking about skills that can negatively impact your life. So, instead of beginning one's career planning at action step four with little focus and hence little chance of successfully finding enjoyable work, a person needs to complete action steps one through three in order to identify the type of work that will be a good fit for their unique design. Then, a resume can be developed that targets that job objective, and that highlights the skills and abilities a person has that qualifies them for the job. Please look at the action steps one more time. Would it surprise you to learn that 80% of job search work actually happens in steps one through three? Not one of these steps says anything about job search work, so why would eighty percent of job search work happen there? Because, these first three steps help you to: (1) target the work for which you are most suited and determine where you can make the best contribution; and, (2) intimately know your God-given design so that you can better articulate how you can meet the employer's needs. Thus, by completing these steps you can not only target the type of work that would be most fulfilling and meaningful, but you can also prepare yourself for "marketing" yourself much more effectively. You job search will be easier and much more productive! We hope that you can see how these action steps build upon one other, and allow you to work in partnership with God to use your gifts and abilities in work that you love to do. If you would like assistance with any of these steps please contact us about individual career counseling. We would consider it a privilege to assist you! Learn more about our many services that can assist you.
© 1999 Copyright by Kevin and Kay Marie Brennfleck.
All rights reserved.
Source: The above information is published electronically on by Kevin
and Kay Marie Brennfleck, and is intended for personal use only. No
commercial use of this information is authorized without written permission
from the copyright owners. For additional information, contact the Brennflecks
at 626/577-2705. The Christian Career Center is found at www.ChristianCareerCenter.com
and on America Online at keyword COCC.
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