I picked my major (Electrical Engineering) because I liked Math and Science…and my Dad was an EE.
I took the relevant courses and found out that I liked to solve problems and think logically, but I did not care for detailed hands on labwork. So when I interviewed, I chose the job that involved talking to customers and figuring out what they needed and engineering the specifications so that software developers could code it.
I kind of came to it in a roundabout way. I was a psychology major doing research in undergrad and I loved research, so I decided I wanted to be a full-time researcher. I knew I would need a PhD and my interests laid in public health, so I got a hybrid PhD in public health and psychology. I had originally intended to do research for the government (like the CDC) or, later, at a university (as a professor) in the field. But graduate school turned me totally off from academia. And none of the jobs I was applying to at think tanks or government agencies were coming through, despite me being qualified. After a while, I also started getting a little bored with my area.
I did a little research and found out that psychologists often went into two other fields: market research and user experience research. They’re cousins, more or less. I’d actually always really loved tech and had considered majoring in advertising when I first started college, so I was interested in both, and decided that I would apply to some of those jobs and see what happened. Well, I got more bites on the UX side, and one of those companies hired me, so here I am. And I love my job - it actually is really perfect for me.
So some hard work and some luck/serendipity.
I started as a EE major expecting to enter the Air Force and then be an airline pilot, but discovered computers in school and landed in software. It’s still fun, like playing Tinker Toys or Erector Set (that dates me) all day for great pay. Some of you ran my code on your Macs!
In high school my favorite courses were history, art and math. I really loved the idea of writing historical novels so that was my senior project. I enjoyed doing the research, but realized I was no novelist. I vaguely thought I’d go into academia, but I also had at the back of my mind that my mother’s parents had been architects. They both died young so I have no memory of them, but it was something I’d heard about. At the end of my freshman year I had to choose a major. I took a freshman seminar in prints and printmaking and realized that I’d shoot myself if I had to do nothing but write papers. So I majored in Visual and Environmental Studies which was a strange mix of studio art classes, art theory, film studies, architectural history, and a couple of design classes. I ended up actually writing an academic thesis as opposed to doing something studio based and then went on to architecture school.
Architecture has been very different from school. Much less artsy design and much more problem solving. It actually has been much more varied than I expected which has been great - sometimes I am making a case before the historical commission, another day arguing something at zoning, another I’m crawling under a deck, the next I’m explaining how you legalize work that’s been done without an architect and the following I’m learning how a day care or restaurant operates. It’s been good for someone like me - interested in a lot of things, well rounded, and probably a bit ADD.
What is market research and user experience research ? My favorite class in high school was P.E. but I also liked English and History. I think I’m a lot like mathmom. I want to learn as many things as I can and do something different each day.
I read a book about computers at age 12 and was completely smitten. Eventually got my PhD in computer science and have been working in the software field for over 25 years now (mostly in machine learning and AI)
My dad, an engineering professor, had a party for his students when I was in high school. He jokingly said that I would be the next engineer in the family. The light bulb went off me - “Why not?” I liked math and the idea of using it to create structures. I wish I had better 3D visualization skills, but otherwise, I like my career.
I transferred colleges after my freshman year. I looked through the college catalog, and looked for a major wit NO math requirements. I landed in speech pathology…figured I would try the courses…and see how it went. Loved them…did very well. And that was that.
Oh…and I had several statistics courses along the way…
I got lucky for sure. I majored in something dry and practical in college because I wanted to make sure I would get a job. I didn’t do any real research on what a typical day would be like using the skills I was learning in college. That turned out to be a huge mistake. The employers lined up to interview us before we even got out of grad school and I went to a football factory and binge beer drinking public so it wasn’t exactly Harvard but it my major they wanted us.
Anyway, to make a long story short I wasn’t a good fit for that career from day one and got “laid off” from my first professional job after college. I was crushed. I thought I was the world’s biggest failure. Hell, my parents had even organized a surprise party for me after grad school with all my hometown friends showing up and I goofed it all up. I got a temp job through a “headhunter” or whatever they are called and paid off my student loans.
So, when the temp job ended I moved to Miami. Why? I don’t know. Just because. This was before the Internet. I went to the local public library before I left and wrote down the addresses of 40 firms in my field and sent them cover letters and resumes and when I got to town, after finding a place to stay, I called them one by one. The second place I called invited me in to interview and I lucked out and got a job within my field. And, once again, I didn’t feel comfortable and didn’t like it but at least I was doing it and learning and everything. I distinctly remember that most people in the offices I worked in basically hated their jobs they just did it because they had kids and mortgages and so forth and they were “trapped” so to speak.
So one fine day, in July, I quit. I didn’t have many bills or responsibility and I just figured “there has to be something better out there” and I was intent on finding it. Pretty soon my money ran out. I ended up working at the mall for min wage. Not cool when you have a masters degree but I was treading water.
I decided, screw it, I’m going back to school and this time I’m going to study something really fun and cool and sexy like filmmaking or something like that. I was at Miami-Dade’s north campus, walking around, when I saw an index card that changed my life. It was posted on one of those boards outside an office. It said they needed adjunct instructors and all you needed was a masters degree in the field and experience and all that stuff. As soon as I saw it I knew that it was perfect for me and what I was looking for. That was over 20 years ago. I spent one year as an adjunct and lucked out again to get a FT tenure track teaching job in a different city. I spent a few years there then got my dream job in the city I grew up in. Sometimes you just know what’s right for you. By the way, I hear a lot of talk about the “rigged” economy. BS. It has always been tough to get a good job. Always.
“It has always been tough to get a good job. Always.” My observation too.
I fell into my current career field basically by accident. It works for now. It is something I would not have thought to be a decent match when I was in high school.
For me, ending up where I am has been a process, and I’m still in process, really, but in the best possible way.
When I was 16, I decided I wanted to be a journalist, and I felt it was perfect for me: I love writing, researching, explaining things, wanted to make a difference, etc. At the time (2001), it was still theoretically realistic to get a full time, 9-5 job with benefits in journalism–one thing I knew about myself is I wanted a desk job with a steady paycheck. Once in j-school, I discovered that the beautiful sub-area of journalism that is criticism–persuasive writing was always a knack of mine–and so I threw myself into wanting to be a film critic. I knew regular reporting wasn’t for me–talking to strangers gave me hives. Alas, by 2006, the journalism industry was starting to go bust, then the recession hit. I couldn’t find a full time job as a journalist, so I took the only jobs I could get: working for my university, travel & expense report processing for a publisher. Then I ended up managing field volunteers and finding homes for exchange students–I had been an exchange student, so international stuff was attractive to me.
I discovered crucial things about myself in that job: I hate sales jobs and cannot perform well in sales-oriented environments (we had a daily student placement goal and worked 7 days a week, 80 hours a week in the summer), BUT I loved the part of my job that involved student/family “match-making” and working with volunteers. Yet, the job I ended up in next: international television marketing. Marketing was/is like magic: it had many of the same elements that drew me to journalism, but came with a steady job/paycheck/benefits and is a stable/growth industry. I love marketing something I care about, and I get to use my persuasive writing skills. I don’t have to take my work home with me, leaving plenty of bandwidth for creative and personal pursuits (I write novels, organize fan conventions, and mentor teens). I actually ended up landing what would have been my “dream job” fresh out of college as a part time gig at a major trade a few years ago–and discovered, belatedly, that I actually HATE entertainment journalism. I had to write one too many stories based Katy Perry tweets (seriously), and have more or less completely abandoned old dreams of being a journalist.
Along the way, I started writing novels, and it is just as fulfilling, if not more fulfilling than journalism–the 16-year-old me that decided journalism was the way didn’t think she could write novels. But things change! I also mentor teen girls and help them get into college–so I get to do the two things I loved most about my exchange student job–work with volunteers/students and match-make (helping girls make college lists is fun!). So now I write novels, market TV, and am moving into the college essay consulting space. Every job helped me figure out what I did and didn’t like, and what I am and am not good at–or could work to be better at. I’m still figuring it out.
This is a great question/thread and I hope some of the teens on the site read it. I try to encourage teenagers both on here and the ones I mentor IRL to have dreams/aspirations, but to be open to where life takes them. I’m glad I had the ambition I did, and j-school was amazing, but I wish I’d been a bit more open-minded way back when… trying to go after journalism when I did lead to some heartache! I wonder what would have happened if I tried novel-writing sooner, or realized that a counseling job would have been super fulfilling…or maybe even something else I haven’t even considered. There are a LOT of careers out there, yet teens seem to gravitate towards the same 10-15 of them, much like the elite schools! And I think Millennials especially have been told to “follow their dreams,” which has lead to a lot of laser focusing, limitation, and disappointment.
Good post #30. I deal with a lot of teens/Millennials and, for the most part, they are massively confused about the job/labor market and who can blame them. I tell them often it is one of the hardest decisions on earth trying to figure out exactly what to major in. Anyway, not to get political, but a good percentage of them have bought in full-time to the message that the economy is rigged in various forms and ways of saying it and you can see how that is affecting the elections in the primaries.
I’ll let people believe what they want. When I am at work, I don’t engage in politics but I do, at appropriate times, let my students know that getting a great job has always been hard. Hard work and honesty and some luck is the key. If you believe in fairy tales, unicorns and ghosts and that prevents you from busting your butt and even falling down a few wells, because you think things are rigged, and spend half your life on the couch playing video games, you are defeating yourself. You’ve got to be tougher than that. And even if you can’t see the road ahead clearer you’ve got to head down it. The economy is rigged message gives people an excuse to be lazy.
Personally, I am 50/50 when it comes to finding a job. I technically have a “disability” and it is easier to get a job if you’re attractive so that kind of limits my opportunities. So far there have been a lot of interesting stories and what kind of mentoring do you guys do ?
Choose to pursue something that you would do even if you weren’t getting paid for it.
I’m writing a book about how to think about career choices over a career trajectory. It’s a bit of a pro bono project as it isn’t in my field but I’ve given a few talks at elite schools and get incredibly enthusiastic responses so I’m bending to my wife’s desire and have found a co-author to see if I can get it out (I’ve written books in my own field).
If you ask successful people how they got into the job they have, you will see that there is almost always some kind of serendipitous event involved in how they got to where they are. They can all tell an ex post story that makes it all seem like a rational path in hindsight, but if you go through each step chronologically there is usually some bumpiness – a bad job or weakness that they worked around – and some kind of chance event. There are folks like doctors and musicians who always knew they wanted to be doctors or musicians, but these are rarer (and many of the folks who always wanted to be doctors wanted it because their parents were doctors, etc.). Ask the adults you know, especially those who seem happy in their jobs, how they got to where they are and whether they enjoy their work and what about it they enjoy.
Part of my advice is to get as much experience as you can while in college. Get internships in different areas and even jobs in school. Many people romanticize various professions and get through their training before discovering that the actual practice of the profession is not challenging or not enlivening (e.g., I know several of my peers and now friends of my son who got law degrees and then realized they really hated the practice of law).
Serendipity, yes. But also the right foundations to do well in whatever job it is. That’s not always job-specific training.
I had several jobs after college that could have been career paths. Hated them and barely made it to six months. (That included one that meshed with what I thought were my interests in college and grad school.) Hated.
Long story, but after a move, I thought of trying to pull on some early data processing experience, for the money. Found something with lousy pay, long hours, commute through LA traffic- but I knew the first week that this would be my career. It was a start-up, an engineering firm marketing a cutting edge product. The amount of tech knowledge one could learn was fascinating and I was up for that. No boring days. But also, a small but aggressive start-up needed all good ideas, you weren’t pegged into one narrow slot. I had zero engineering training, but worked with sw and hw developers, mostly CEs or EEs. Later moved into marketing as a bridge between the tech side and client needs. Never did lose interest. I now work in a different field, but that was my main career.
Ironically, D1 is following a similar path, different environment, but tech knowledge used in marketing. Humanities major.
Agree, @lookingforward, that one of the critical factors is having the foundations (training, capacity to learn on one’s own) to build the right human capital as one goes forward. The two jobs I have had for the vast bulk of my adult career didn’t exist when I was in college. So, what has mattered the most is the ability to learn new things and create new ideas. As software wipes out many white collar jobs and service jobs over the next decade or two, the capacity to learn, probably combined with some technical skills, will be critically important.