Making informed decisions and being enterprising
My assembly this week is on making informed decisions and being enterprising. In this lockdown period I’ve been talking to a lot of students of all years who are worried about their future and their careers. In this time of uncertainty, especially in the jobs market, it is so important to research, think and then plan some actions. Even if, in this period, you are taking stock of your position on your career journey or spending time building your portfolio, this is invaluable time spent investing in yourself and your future. (Plus it often helps you feel more in control of your situation)! Spend time looking through my resources here to help you make informed decisions about your career path.
If you ever feel stuck in your career journey, spend time reflecting on yourself and your situation. Use this guide to help you…
Assess yourself
Before you can choose the right career for you, you must learn about yourself. Your values, interests, soft skills, and aptitudes, in combination with your personality type, make some occupations a good fit for you and others completely inappropriate. Practising identifying your values, interests and aptitudes will serve you throughout your life: you will always need to evidence these in job and training applications and interviews.
Identify your transferable skills
Review job profiles for inspiration – websites such as https://www.prospects.ac.uk/job-profiles – will highlight key skills and responsibilities required across a range of different job profiles
Identify your career priorities
What are your career priorities?
A career priority is something important to you that forms part of your job.
It could be linked to salary, size of company, industry, location, full time or part time hours.
Write these down and rank your priorities in order of preference.
Identify careers
Conduct a job search
Explore careers that link to your careers priorities. https://www.prospects.ac.uk/job-profiles
Identify the jobs or careers that match your priorities and explore these further - what training do you need? What skills and knowledge do you need? How can you work to achieve these?
Use labour market information
Labour market information (LMI) provides statistics, research and analysis about current and future economic and job trends. This can help you to make decisions about what careers to look into, how stable certain areas and industries are and what opportunities are available to you.
What is the jobs market like where you want to work? I’ve included the job market information for Hertsmere above.
How will this affect your prospects?
Check out HOP in the next section for more information.
Hertfordshire Opportunities Portal
HOP is the premier gateway in Hertfordshire to find out about:
career path options
apprenticeships and work experience
skills development and professional qualification programmes.
https://www.hopinto.co.uk
Use this to help you look for possible jobs and careers in our area, as well as training in Hertfordshire.
Making informed choices
Use your career priorities and information about the local labour market to help you make decisions about what kind of job your would like and where you might find that job.
Being Enterprising
Being enterprising essentially means - being ready to embark on new ventures, being full of boldness and initiative. If you are enterprising you are ready to undertake important, difficult, or new projects, this can be characterised by using imagination and initiative. Being enterprising ties in with being an entrepreneur, but you can still be enterprising even if you are not starting a business or project.
Watch the video on this website for some inspiration:
Enterprising skills
creative and innovative thinking (in fact, it could be argued that entrepreneurs take an innovation and make it commercially viable).
problem solving and analytical skills (an entrepreneurial solution usually starts with identifying a problem and spotting trends)
influencing skills (gaining agreement and support from prospective clients is essential)
negotiation, persuasiveness and selling skills
drive and being results-oriented
Other Video Inspiration
Need more help?
Search ESA Careers Events in Google Calendar and add this to your calendar.
Go to the Careers Google Classrooms for lots more resources!
Email - lauren.christy@esaacademy.org for one to one help or advice!