Student Career Confidence - THE must-have guide to success

A quote comes to mind "All roads are correct, when you don't know where you're going".

While you don't have to be crystal clear in what you want, picking a direction can be important.

What do you want - can be a challenging question for some

• When you graduate?

  • What would be a dream job?

• Before you retire?

  • What would be a dream career?

• Before you pass away?

  • What would be your dream legacy?

It's a common challenge for students to not know what they want.

It’s ok to not know!

• What DON’T you want?

  • Find the opposite!

• What are you at least interested in?

  • Explore!

• What if I have too many options?

  • Pick one to start!

Most people can't academically think of what they want. Thinking brings more thinking.

Consider taking action and exploring experiencing.

“Clarity comes from Action not thought”  -Marie Forleo

If you do know what you want, you could skip this section, though it would be useful for you to take a listen to confirm. The insights might help you further refine your wants.

We start with 4 exercises to help you understand what you want.

If you know what you want, consider still doing the exercises to refine what you want or get a clearer picture.

1. I want list

2. 5221 journaling

3. Ikigai brainstorm

4. Retirement (“anti-regrets”) memo

Before you start, begin with a gratitude exercise.

Do a ROSE gratitude exercise.

Consider: What are you Thankful for?

• Relationship: a person

• Opportunity: something upcoming

• Simple: something you might take for granted

• Experience: something you’ve done

To complete the exercises, go Purpose worksheet resource.

Make a copy then fill it out!

Go to the "Purpose worksheet template" resource for a template to do the exercise (or get a piece of paper and pen and do it on your own).

Write I want then whatever it is you want!

Could be anything.

Do it 30 times.

As quickly as you can

No judgement, no restrictions, no filtering

What do YOU want? Be selfish

If you can't get 30, then stop after 30 mins and allocate time to revisit later on.

Take a look to observe:

• Which “wants” stand-out? What patterns do you see?

• Was writing your “wants” challenging?

  • Fear of Commitment/Unknown/Failure: → Mindset training

  • Ability: Learn! Progress vs Perfection!

  • Not enough resources

    • Time: Make instead of find time

    • Money: Be creative!

    • Connections: Quality THEN Quantity

Ikigai is a Japanese concept and roughly translates to “Reason for being”.

Take 4 circles

1. What you love doing

2. What you're good at

3. What the world needs

4. What the world will pay for (i.e. Money)

Over lap them.

The middle intersection of all 4 circles is the Ikigai.

But beware of the Ikigai trap!

Take some time to do an Ikigai brainstorm. Brainstorm

• What you’re good at

• What you love doing

Then see where the world might need those skills and how you could get paid for it.

Go to the Purpose Worksheet template for a template

Take some time to reflect on what you did that drained you.

What you did that energized you.

Then how can you minimize what drains you and more importantly, maximize what energizes you.

Then do it retroactively for this week, month, quarter, year, decade!

See what patterns you notice.

Go to the Purpose worksheet template resource for a template.

Take time to write your retirement memo:

Imagine that you have retired and are looking back at your career and life. Everything that you had hoped and dreamed of, happened. What happened?

The exercise helps you to define what is “Happiness” and “success” for you. Or at least start the exploration.

Also consider it as an “Anti-regrets memo”

You can also consider the question: “If you could do something and you knew you wouldn’t fail, what would you do?

Plus You can have multiple variations!

Go to the Purpose worksheet template resource for a template

Even if you don't have everything crystal clear,

Pick a direction and let’s go!

You can make adjustments along the way.

You may encounter some of these common obstacles:

• I don’t know what I want

  • Fear of commitment or judgement

• Someone (parents, family, etc.) wouldn’t approve

  • Communication + Entitlement

• That role won’t make a lot of money

  • Expectations + Creativity

• I want too many things!

  • Pick one!

What if I have FOMO?

Watch the video for some ways to deal with these obstacles!

Pick a starting point for both of your short term and long term goals.

Short term goals are the job when you graduate.

Long term goals are the career you want to have in 10+ years.

Purpose is different from Passion.

For some they can be inter-related.

For others, they can be quite different.

Understand what both are for you can be helpful.

Why you have a definite purpose, then your motivation can be much stronger.

Procrastination = Excuses > Purpose

Motivation = Purpose > Excuses

• Internal: Purpose → Why?

• External: Accountability

Doing a 5 WHYs exercise can help.

Think of what you want, then ask yourself.

Why is that important to you?

Do that 5 times.

FOCUS on you, no repeats.

If you get stuck, revisit later

I procrastinated a lot as a student. And still do today. Though much less than before.

Typically when we procrastinate, it's be cause of 1 of 4 reasons:

Typically because we…

1. Don’t know WHAT to do

2. Don’t know HOW to do it

3. Don’t know WHY I’m doing it

4. I’m afraid to do it

Student Career Confidence comes from a few core elements. Master each of them and you will definitely level up your Career Confidence!

• Time: Time Management + Habits

• Mindset: Growth Mindset + Mental Fitness

• Academics: Memory + Learning Ability

• Career: Job Search Skill + Purpose

• Human Skills: Communication + Interpersonal

We'll deep dive in subsequent sections

Student Career Confidence is a journey.

Start with the checklist and then set it into a plan to consistently learn and improve.

Take about 8 hrs to start and do the activities we've listed so far.

You might be faster.

Then allocate time every day (or at least every week) to continue where you left off in the various areas.

We'll deep dive into each element in subsequent sections

There really is no such thing as Time Management.

What you can do is manage your priorities and manage your attention.

And of course, if you do so with a better mindset, then getting things done just gets easier

Consider what you do on 2 axis's: 

• Important vs Not-important

• Urgent vs Not Urgent

Spend more time on the Important and Non-Urgent and you'll be significantly more successful!

What are you spending your time on?

Are they the important "Big Rocks"?

Or is it on gravel, sand or water? 

Be sure to prioritize!

Learn some basic prioritization methods from:

• Ivy Lee

• Warren Buffet

• Weekly/daily planning

Where do you spend your time? 

Where do you want to spend your time?

Take a look at both and you'll be much more productive!

Have you ever thought of your Chrono-Type? 

• Lion/Lark - early riser

• Bear/3rd Bird - average time

• Wolf/Night Owl - late night productivity

How best you function based on timing.

Knowing your Chrono-Type can help you unlock more productivity.

Learn productivity tools such as:

1. “Eat your frog first”: Do when your willpower is full (chronotype)

2. Uni-task: Task switching loses time between activities

3. Important vs Urgent vs Significant: Will you remember in 1 week, month, year, decade?

4. Schedule your procrastination: Add “procrastination” to your model week

5. Set your environment for success: Minimize distractions

6. Mediate: Be mindful and present!

7. Do more by saying NO more often: Saying Yes means saying No to everything else!

8. “Two birds with one stone”: Not multi-task, checking off two boxes

9. “Get the ball rolling”: Allow others to do their work, while you do yours

10. Small consistent actions :Turn it into a habit!

11. Accountability: You are the average of the 5 people you spend the most time with

12. Schedule email, social media, instant messagingFocus on the task at hand, and still communicate

13. Buffer time: Leave time for unexpected surprises and know what to do during buffer time

14. Progress vs perfection: Don’t let perfect be the enemy of the good

15. Have a productive commute: Use your time in transit wisely

    
    

    
    

Put your time management skills into practice and do a time audit, create your model week and optimize for the future!

When you master your mindset, then your reality starts improving.

Look into your Thoughts, Feelings and Actions, which are all enabled by Awareness.

Awareness is the first step to mastering your mindset

Understand the STFAR model

Stimulus initiates a Thought,

with turns into a Feeling,

which causes you to do (or not do) an Action,

which turns into your results

Consider Responding to a stimulus vs Reacting.

And understand is that it is a choice, which is your ultimate super power!

Are you your thoughts? Are your thoughts you? 

Changing your perspective about your thoughts can be eye opening and a game changer to to master your mindset.

Learn about the 3 You's and the importance of the words you use

Interpreting your feelings then changing them with your thoughts, because an amazing super power.

Practice getting better at feeling and you'll start feeling better as well.

Taking action from optimistic thoughts and feelings can be the difference between a helpful outcome and a non-helpful one.

While you can't be guaranteed success, you can stack odds in your favour!

Put your mindset management skills into practice and do some journaling, pre-process your thoughts and "The Work"

Learning should be a lifelong skill and habit.

We'll share more on how to learn, how to improve your grades and how to get experience to maximize your education experience.

Learning is a meta-skill (skill of skills) that will help you improve everything.

Invest the time to learn and not only will school be easier, but also your career and life!

Do grades really mean anything? 

Yes and No.

When you learn these learning skills then you are bound to get better grades!

Develop "Mastery learning" habits and you'll elevate your future career success.

While school is focused on classes and grades, in this market, experience can be just as, if not, more important than grades.

Employers often expect experience for you to be competitive.

The more experiential learning opportunities you can find, the better your job prospects.

Also be mindful of balancing other parts of your life with academics.

While grades are important, they aren't everything and you'll want to learn to balance everything else.

Consider doing a "Learning Audit"

Adopt a Mastery Learning mindset and go back to fill in any learning gaps and also strengthen your foundations.

Take some time to to focus on the most important elements of the job search.

Pick an area of Focus THEN expand.

Plus improve your interview skills, networking skills, resume writing skills and hopefully you're already getting the experience to be able to share in all of those job search areas.

If you are part of the FOCUS inspired Academy, access the Effective Job Search Course (refer to the resources).

How do you know you're doing enough on your job search? 

How do you know you're doing well? 

We'll share benchmarks to help you become more successful in the job search.

Networking is by far the best way to find future opportunities.

Not just networking, building meaningful connections.

Learn now to do so, even if you're a shy introvert!

Can you tell me about yourself?

How about with a response that's at least an 8/10 and ideally a 9 or even 10/10.

If you can't, add some practice as you need to develop your skills to be competitive in the job search.

And believe me, it is very competitive!

If you join the FOCUS inspired Academy, you'll get access to Yoodli to help you practice with AI!

Take time to learn how to write a resume that lands your interviews.

If you take time to practice interview questions and network, you'll find that your resume writing skills improve as well.

So that's why we start there.

Allocate time to explore the jobs that you want, plus network and build meaningful connections.

Also, understand your experience gaps, and plan to fill them!

We went through various Human Skills at a high level including:

• Job Search Skills: Resumes, Interviews, Networking, Portfolio/Experience

• Mindset

• Productivity

Two other important human skills for a student are

1. Communication

2. Physical Health

Communication skills start with

• Mindset

• Delivery

• Content

• Reception

Communication skills become challenging based on context such as:

• Situation: Everyday, Meetings, Reports, Feedback

• Types: Practical, Emotional, Social

Allocate time to improve your communication skills.

Communication is a keystone skill that will improve many other skills!

Practice speaking to the folks around you.

Join debate clubs, case competitions or organizations like Toastmasters.

Physical health is another keystone skill, and when you invest the time to improve your physical health, so many other areas of your life improve.

Have the right mindset, add movement and exercise to your day, make good food choices, and get a good amount of sleep.

Most are not typically not associated with a student THOUGHT if you can develop those habits, then you can set yourself for more career success!

You don't have to be perfect with your physical health, though look to be a little better this week vs last week.

This month vs last month.

Add 1 more hour or day of physical activity.

Pick 1 more meal in the week to make better food choices.

Pick 1 day to improve the quality of your sleep.

You can do it!