How do I decide what to study?
You may be feeling quite stressed out about making this BIG decision and unsure how to choose a career that will be right for you… Well – relax, follow these Self-Help Steps, including the quiz on your working personality, and youll be a whole lot more equipped to make a good choice when youre done!
Knowing which careers or jobs suit you is a process of discovery. The “Helping you decide on your career” section is about finding out what you are good at, what kind of person you are, what careers are out there and then matching this information together. Its also about listening to your gut feeling because you are the expert on yourself! Very often you actually know what career directions seem interesting to you, but you may need some confirmation of this in order to feel more confident about your choice.
We have included this section to give you more information to help make your choices. Choosing what to study and knowing what career direction this will lead you to is a really important choice that will affect you for a long time. So, put in the effort to gather the right information about yourself and your career choices.
Knowing yourself
You’ve got some self exploring to do!
Look at the descriptions below.
For each number, choose either the grey description or the red
ask someone who knows you well to select the descriptions they think sound like you. On what side have you selected more descriptions?
GREY– Many GREY answers suggest that you enjoy spending time with many different people for a large part of your day, and meeting new people. Your future career probably needs to focus a lot on people.
RED- Many RED answers suggest that you enjoy your own space and work well on your own. Be careful of jobs in which you will have a lot of contact with people!
Now select from the following additional descriptions.
Which side did you choose the most descriptions from?
GREY– If you chose more GREY descriptions, then perhaps you will like the courses on offer at university.
RED– If you chose more of the RED options, then you may prefer courses on offer at universities of technology or Technical Vocational and Education Training (TVET) colleges. But be careful – this is not always the case. Find out how much study and memorising versus practical work and in-situation training is involved in the study direction you choose.
Rate three of the following interests that sound like you!
Here are some ideas of the careers these interests could lead you to.
Certain types of people match certain types of careers. Sometimes parents, friends, or your community may try to push you towards a career that you know you’re not right for. Sometimes your friends are all studying something – so you feel you should too. Other times you hear that you might get a bursary for a certain course and this makes you want to choose it. Be careful, as you will spend a large amount of your life working… and working in the wrong job can be stressful and unfulfilling.
Knowing what careers you really wouldn’t like to do is VERY important, too… Write down five careers you wouldn’t like to do. Knowing what you dont want to do is just as important as knowing what you want to do. Perhaps you dont really like the idea of working with and caring for people, so a job in teaching, nursin, or social work puts you off. Maybe you dont enjoy working with numbers, so careers in engineering or accounting seem unexciting.
Write down two careers you feel someone else would like you to do that you dont think are really right for you…
Think of the three school subjects you did well in or enjoyed. Write these down. These are strong areas for you and could be used in your future career. Was there a subject you wished you could have taken that was not offered by your school?
The Department of Higher Education and Training has a Career Advice Service where fully qualified Career Advisors provide career information, guidance and advice by telephone: Call them on 086 999 0123 Website http://www.careerhelp.org.za Email them on careerhelp@dhet.gov.za or callcentre@dhet.gov.za OR communicate with them via Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/careerhelp
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