CAO HANDBOOK ENTRY 2016
15
8. Deciding on Your Career
Someone who enjoys
studying and theory.
Someone who enjoys
doing.
Someone who enjoys
memorising work.
Someone who enjoys
working with their hands.
Well read.
Realistic and handy.
Academically talented.
A practical thinker.
Someone who loves
book learning.
Interested in knowing how
things work or how to do
tasks.
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 you'll be a whole lot more equipped to
make a good choice when you're done!
Knowing which careers or jobs suit you is a
process of discovery.The " Howdo I decidewhat
to study?" 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. It's 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.
The CAO has 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.
Self-help steps
On a scale of 1 to 10, rate how ready you feel to
make a career choice?
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
1 means that you feel very unprepared and 10
means you feel you have all the information
you need to make a good choice. If you've
chosen a number less than 10, you need
more preparation, so keep going!
Okay, let's get started with gathering
more information to help you make a good
study choice.
Knowing yourself
To learn more about yourself, you're going
to need a pen... no, really... you're going to
need to go and get a pen, you've got some
self exploring to do!
Step 1.
Look at the descriptions below.
For each number, choose either the green
description or the blue. Circle the one that
sounds more like you.
‘People's person’ ‘Your own person’
Step 2.
Using a different colour pen, ask
someone who knows you well to circle the
descriptions they think sound like you.
On what side do you have more circled
descriptions?
GREEN
– Many green 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.
BLUE
– Many BLUE 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!
Step 3.
For each description, circle either
the pink or yellow side.
‘Study focused’ ‘Practically minded’
Which side have you got more circled
descriptions in?
1. Confident with large
groups of people.
Someone who enjoys
smaller groups of people.
2. Inspired and energised
by being with people a
large portion of the day.
Someone who enjoys their
own company.
3. Friendly and
outgoing.
Reserved and often a ‘deep
thinker'.
4. A people's person
who has a wide social
network.
Comfortable spending time
‘one on one' with a good
friend or a few close friends.
5. Spending the whole
weekend going out
with friends and family
sounds like fun.
Having some time with
friends and family as well as
having some space sounds
relaxing.
