The main mistakes when choosing a profession. A pressing problem for young people is choosing a profession. Ignorance of the prospects and requirements of the labor market

Today's notes are about what mistakes young people make when choosing a profession.

So, what not to do...

1. Attitude to the choice of profession as unchangeable.
In any field of activity, there is a change in occupations and positions as a person’s qualifications increase. At the same time, the greatest success is achieved by those who have passed the initial stages well. Analyze the situation on the labor market. Please note that every year new professions appear. Be prepared for the fact that you will have to regularly improve your skills and master related specialties. Do not be afraid that the choice of profession now, in the 11th grade, will fatally determine your entire destiny. Changing your choice and mastering a new specialty will make you a valuable specialist in demand in interdisciplinary fields of activity. Your first profession, even if you later change your mind and find something more attractive, will come in handy in unexpected situations. For example, the first education of an art critic will help a lawyer with his second education to understand the complex issues of inheritance of antique values...

2. Current opinions about the prestige of the profession.
Prejudices regarding professions are manifested in the fact that some professions and occupations important to society are considered unworthy obscene (for example: garbage man).An economist or a psychologist is no more useful to society than a chemist or mechanic. The prestige of the profession should be taken into account - but after taking into account your interests and abilities. Otherwise, you will have (if you have) a “fashionable” but not enjoyable specialty. Or, what the hell, you will find yourself unfit to perform basic job functions...

3. Choosing a profession under the influence of friends (for company, so as not to fall behind).
We choose a profession according to our “taste” and “size” just like clothes and shoes. A sense of group and peer orientation are very positive characteristics of children your age. They are needed to master the norms of behavior in society, form the image of “I” and self-esteem. Therefore, look around at others, COMPARING (yourself with friends), and not blindly repeating. Try to see how you differ from your comrades - and how you are similar. This will help you understand that if Vasya becomes a firefighter (and he is a risky person), you may not like this profession (you are very careful and reasonable).

4. Transferring the attitude towards a person, a representative of a particular profession, to the profession.
When choosing a profession, you must first of all take into account the characteristics of this type of activity, and not choose a profession just because you like or don’t like the person who is engaged in this type of activity. Being fascinated by a teacher is especially dangerous (if you admire the sincerity of a physicist, this does not mean that you like physics in itself, outside the “set”). In addition, children often make the mistake of trying to become an idol - an athlete, a politician, a journalist, an artist. Athletes - they are not all like that.

5. Passion only for the external or some private side of the profession.
Behind the ease with which an actor creates an image on stage, there is intense, everyday work. And journalists do not always appear on television programs - more often they sift through a lot of information, archives, talk with dozens of people - before preparing a 10-minute message, which, moreover, will be voiced by another (TV announcer).

6. Identification of a school subject with a profession or poor differentiation of these concepts.
There is such a subject as a foreign language, and there are many professions that require language ability - translator, tour guide, international telephone operator, etc. Therefore, when choosing a profession, you need to take into account what real occupations and professions are behind this subject. To do this, it is best not to just study profession charts or dictionaries of professions. It is worth analyzing newspapers with vacancies on the labor exchange (they usually indicate what education is required for a specific vacancy). For example, a person with a linguistic education ("Russian language and literature", "foreign language" at school) can work as a teacher, translator, editor, and assistant secretary. Moreover, keep in mind that there are more professions than school subjects. You can become a lawyer, marketer, or apparatchik. Professions can usually be associated with several school subjects (usually corresponding to entrance exams to a university when entering this specialty). For example, a future economist may like both mathematics and geography at school.

7. Outdated ideas about the nature of labor in the sphere of material production.
Complex and interesting technology is being introduced into all professions, and especially blue-collar workers, and the work culture is improving. (And computers are being introduced into absolutely all areas of activity - right down to livestock farming).

8. Inability/unwillingness to understand one’s personal qualities (inclinations, abilities).
Career consultants, parents, teachers, and comrades will help you understand yourself. Psychological tests, as well as articles and publications on popular psychology, may also be useful. However, keep in mind that many of them are unprofessional, so be critical of both the test results and what is written in psychological books. The purpose of popular tests is to intensify the activity of self-knowledge (self-observation, introspection), and not to give you a ready-made answer to the question of who to be or sticking a label on what kind of person you are.

9. Ignorance/underestimation of one’s physical characteristics and shortcomings that are significant when choosing a profession.
There are professions that may be contraindicated for you, because... they may worsen your health. There are few such professions and they include mainly those that require prolonged stress of certain physiological systems. Computer scientists strain their eyes, but pilots strain their hearts...

10. Ignorance of basic actions, operations and their order when solving, thinking about a problem when choosing a profession.
When you solve a math problem, you perform certain actions in a certain sequence. It would be wise to do the same when choosing a profession. I hope that knowing and understanding these mistakes will help you avoid them when choosing your future profession.

Anna Sukhikh

Typical mistakes when choosing a profession.

Choosing a profession is a difficult and responsible step in the life of every person. Choosing the right profession means finding your place in life. To make this decision, it is important to have reliable information about your inclinations and abilities necessary for professional activity, existing professions and specialties, educational institutions and the demand for various professions in the labor market.

Of the many professions, it is necessary to choose one, and even one that your soul is drawn to, it is quite difficult. Of course, no one is immune from mistakes, but you want the probability of a mistake to be as small as possible.

All mistakes made when choosing a profession can be divided into points:

  1. Attitude to the choice of profession as unchangeable (i.e. “for the rest of your life”).

In any field of activity, there is a change in occupations and positions as the qualifications of the specialty increase. At the same time, the greatest success is achieved by those who have passed the initial stages well.

Analyzing the situation on the labor market now, we can say that new professions appear every year. Be prepared for the fact that you will have to regularly improve your skills and master related professions. Changing your choice and mastering a new specialty will make you a valuable specialist in demand in interdisciplinary fields of activity. Your first profession, even if you later change your mind and find something more attractive, will come in handy in unexpected situations.

For example, a psychologist, having acquired additional knowledge in the field of management and labor records management, can build his career in the field of personnel management. Also, an economist in foreign economic activity inevitably faces legal issues, so he is often forced to obtain a legal education, which may allow him to change his field of activity. Recently, in the manufacturing and industrial sectors, managers and marketers with basic technical education are required.

Scientific and technological progress requires mastery of new information technologies and means of communication, and this applies not only to mid- and senior-level specialists, but also to working professions, because production is becoming high-tech.

Today, educational services for adults have become widespread: various professional courses from masons to currency traders, second higher education and professional retraining, higher education based on secondary vocational training, advanced training courses and courses in foreign languages, rhetoric, etc. In addition, there are government programs for the retraining of specialists, for example, military personnel transferred to the reserve, or unemployed citizens, etc.

2. Current opinions about the prestige of the profession.

In relation to the profession, prejudice is manifested in the fact that some professions and occupations that are important to society are considered unworthy and indecent. Everyone wants to do beautiful work, but who will do the “dirty, ugly” work?

High earnings and social status in society are the main criteria by which a conclusion is made: whether a profession is prestigious or not. The magazine “Career” often publishes articles about building a career using examples of individual successful individuals, from which it follows that a really good education is a solid foundation for building a career, but this is only the beginning of a long journey. Talk to your parents, your acquaintances, many of them studied at institutes, what are their classmates doing now? Who has achieved what successes? Everyone received the same profession, however, salaries and social status and even areas of activity are different.

The prestige of the profession largely depends on the mood in society, on the ideals and principles among young people, and they, as we know, change. The easiest way to trace this is in the history of our country.In the 60s, the profession of a geologist, for example, or a design engineer were very popular and prestigious among young people. What happened to these professions during the years of “stagnation”? Playing chess in the workplace, boring uninteresting work, low wages - all these were attributes of the engineering profession.As a result, technical universities have problems with recruitment, and those who graduate from a technical university do not go to work in their specialty.Today, production is being revived; many intermediary firms working in industry need young, energetic specialists with a technical education, of which there are very few. The limited supply makes these specialists very in demand, and therefore well paid. Thus, the prestige of a profession also depends on the state of the labor market.

Of course, there are professions that are called “for all time”, which are always prestigious, but these are mainly creative professions: actors, musicians, artists, etc. However, is it prestigious to be an actor without roles, or a musician without listeners?

3. Choosing a profession under the direct or indirect influence of comrades (i.e. “For company”).

Most often, this mistake occurs when the choice of profession is made only on the basis of interests and inclinations. As you know, friends are, first of all, united by common interests and hobbies. Therefore, choosing the same profession with a friend is considered absolutely natural for teenagers. This also happens due to the fear of making an independent choice, the fear of making a mistake. Often, simply out of laziness, for example, a friend and his parents found out everything, chose an educational institution, and weighed everything up, why do anything else themselves. Many high school students perceive entering a university as a certain stage of fun (student) in which it is better to go with a friend. Many, oddly enough, don’t care at all where they go to study; we used to go to school together, now we’ll go to a vocational school or technical school together. Of course, this is not correct. Firstly, each person is an individual and has his own unique set of abilities and inclinations.Example: Vasya goes to fight a fireman (and he is a risky and fearless person), and Kolya, following him (by nature, very careful and judicious), in the end Vasya will still be a fireman, but Kolya is unlikely.Secondly, each family has its own capabilities, which you may not know about.

4. Transferring the attitude towards a person - a representative of a particular profession - to the profession itself.

When choosing a profession, you must take into account, first of all, the characteristics of this type of activity, and not choose a profession just because you like or don’t like the person who is engaged in this type of activity. Charm by the teacher is especially important(if you admire the sincerity of a physicist, this does not mean that you like doing physics) . In addition, one should not strive to become an idol - an athlete, politician, journalist, artist.

5. Passion only for the external or some private side of the profession.

Psychologically, we tend to pay attention to the most attractive features of a particular activity for us.. And we don’t think about many other aspects at all. As a result, the image of even a well-known profession is significantly distorted. After all, behind the ease with which an actor creates an image on stage, there is intense everyday work. And journalists do not always appear on television programs - more often they go through a lot of information, archives, talk with dozens of people - before preparing a 10-minute report.

Applicants to pedagogical universities exhibit very clear examples of this range of illusions. Many people are brought here by their passion for studying their favorite science (mathematics, interest in history, etc.), but the actual work of a teacher attracts little.

Let's take the profession of a designer as an example. The work of a designer is associated, first of all, with creativity, a free schedule, big money, communication with interesting and wealthy people, as well as fame and social life. However, this profession also has unattractive sides. First of all, it is painstaking and hard work, often associated with physical activity. Work on a specific project can last several weeks, or even months, without days off. In addition, we must not forget that the designer works for the customer, and accordingly must take into account the client’s wishes and his vision of the result of the work, which do not always coincide with the creative idea of ​​the designer himself. But the main difficulty in this profession is finding employment. Even the largest companies work “from order to order” and this break can be quite long. Competition in this market is already high. As in any creative profession, recognition of a designer as a professional may come already at the institute, or it may never come. Unfortunately, this does not even depend on abilities and the measure of talent.

6. Identification of a school subject with a profession or poor differentiation of these concepts.

First of all, when choosing a profession, you need to take into account what real occupations and professions are behind it.There is such a subject as a foreign language, and there are many professions that require language ability - translator, tour guide, international telephone operator, etc. And a person with a linguistic education can work as a teacher, a translator, an editor, and a secretary-referent.

It is important to know that there are more professions than school subjects.

7. Outdated ideas about the nature of labor in the sphere of material production.

At this time, complex and interesting technology is being introduced into all professions, and especially workers, and the work culture is improving. And the computer is being introduced into all areas of activity - right down to livestock farming.

8. Inability to understand, lack of habit of understanding one’s personal qualities.

Career consultants, parents, teachers, and friends can help you understand yourself. Psychological tests can also be useful, but the purpose of the tests is to enhance the activity of self-knowledge (i.e., introspection, introspection), do not expect a ready-made answer from the test.

9. Ignorance or underestimation of one’s physical characteristics and shortcomings that are significant when choosing a profession.

The price of this mistake is very high - health. Many teenagers with health problems do not correlate them with their choice of profession. They choose an educational institution, take exams, but do not pass the medical examination due to health reasons. And at this stage, parents begin to get involved, looking for all sorts of ways for their child to end up in the chosen educational institution. But the fact is that medical contraindications did not appear by chance, since there are professions that require prolonged stress of certain physiological systems.(For example: computer scientists and tailors put a lot of strain on their eyes, but pilots strain their hearts).Therefore, it is not the relationship between professional activity and health that can lead to the most severe consequences.

10. Ignorance of basic actions, operations and their order when solving, thinking about a problem when choosing a profession.

The main thing here is that the teenager approaches the matter creatively and develops his own plan for himself - a list of actions necessary for choosing a profession. This may include: analysis of offers on the education market, analysis of demand in the labor market, objective assessment of one’s abilities, inclinations and knowledge. An important assistant in this can be: career guidance lessons, which should teach you the basics of choosing the right profession and technologies for selecting an educational institution.

Many schools have their own psychological services, where specialists can provide the necessary consultations; if these are not available, then the schools have information about specialized district and city organizations where they will provide assistance in professional self-determination. Many teenagers do not even know where to start choosing the appropriate profession, and often seek to shift responsibility to others, for example, to parents or teachers.

When a profession is chosen, an equally important question inevitably arises: where to get it. The market for educational services is extremely unstable, educational institutions appear and close, state educational standards change, the names of specialties and qualifications change. It is almost impossible to understand this situation on your own. Very often, applicants and parents don’t even know what to ask at the Open Day or the Admissions Committee. The selection of an educational institution must be done very carefully. A random choice of an educational institution can lead to the most unexpected consequences: you may not receive a state-issued diploma, or in this diploma they will write another specialty for you, the university may simply close, it may turn out that the internship will not be organized, and in this case, where will the practical skills come from? etc.

1.Independent professional guidance/Under general Ed. V.D. Rozhkova. – St. Petersburg: Fortex LLC, 2002. – 136 p. From 55-56

2. Organization of career guidance work in educational institutions.Part 2. Bryansk, 1999, pp. 13-16

Youth is a generation of people going through the stage of growing up, which means the formation of personality, the acquisition of knowledge, social values ​​and norms necessary to become a full-fledged and full-fledged member of society.

This period of life can be regarded as a time of opportunity, aspiration to the future, when various prospects are open to you. Right now you have to make a choice that will determine the rest of your life. How important it is for it to be correct! Many, faced with the need to choose a profession, are very worried, because they are afraid to take responsibility for their actions. Of course, young people try to rely on their interests, but they change over time, and the profession will remain with them forever.

Graduates have a very vague and often incorrect idea of ​​what their future profession should be. In schools, if they introduce students to certain types of activities, it is only theoretically. Few people have the opportunity to get to know her clearly. There are no practical courses that can help in understanding what their job will actually be like. For example, a person dreamed throughout his childhood about becoming a doctor, imagining how he, in a clean white coat, sits decorously in an office, slowly, finding out the complaints of patients; how easy it is to make diagnoses, saving the lives of thousands of people. But in fact, he turns out to be completely unprepared for this activity: he loses consciousness from the sight of blood, cannot perform a medical procedure, because he is afraid to cause pain even for the good, or he does not have the patience to listen to the numerous complaints of too boring patients. And it turns out that it is difficult to make a correct diagnosis, especially when time is limited, and it is also not easy to take responsibility for someone’s life. Or, while receiving an economic or legal education, he dreams of a career as a financier, but in reality turns out to be unclaimed in the labor market, because there is currently an overabundance of these specialists in Russian society. There are many such examples.

Parents often influence the choice of profession by offering their child the type of activity in which they themselves are successful. Or, on the contrary, they advise not to choose it if their professional career has not worked out. There are situations when parents do not want to accept their child’s own choice, considering it incorrect, inappropriate, illusory. And it can be very difficult for him to avoid doubts and not change his decision.

The media also plays a role. More recently, in the Soviet past, blue-collar jobs were promising: films were made about factory workers, and the Stakhanovist movement was praised in newspapers and magazines. Now society is focused on getting everything at once, choosing a profitable profession, and not the one to which the soul lies. For example, many modern girls dream of repeating the career path of famous models, actresses or singers, watching their lives from television screens and the covers of fashionable glossy magazines, considering studying a useless activity.

The financial situation of parents now has a great influence on the choice of profession, since most higher educational institutions are paid, and there are very few budget places. Not everyone has the opportunity to pay for the education of their child, who, perhaps, could succeed in his chosen activity. Although other, less capable, but wealthier children receive such an education. He has to opt for any other profession available to him.

Also, few people realize that they will have to do the activity they have chosen for most of their life, and therefore it is very important that they like it in order to go to work with pleasure, and not count the minutes until the end of their work shift, cursing themselves in their hearts for the wrong choice. In addition, it is very important that there are abilities for the chosen activity, since if they are not there, then the person most likely will not succeed in this profession and will waste time getting the appropriate education. Here it is important to understand what sciences you are inclined towards: the humanities, natural sciences or science, and also to assess your communication skills, physical and physiological capabilities.

Friends can also influence the choice of profession. In some situations, when a person has not yet decided what he really likes, he goes to enroll in some educational institution for his comrades.

Currently, there are vocational guidance tests that will help determine your area of ​​interest and personal characteristics, and you will have the opportunity to choose any activity from those offered.

With such a variety of factors influencing the choice of your future profession, making the absolutely right choice is very difficult, if not impossible. The fear of making a mistake by choosing the wrong path in life, which they want to follow for many years, can fetter young people, depriving them of the determination to take the first step. At the same time, it should be remembered that not everything is so bad. The best way to find out what you really like is to try something yourself. It should be remembered that there are no irreparable mistakes when choosing a profession. Unlike previous times, changing occupation is not something unusual for a modern person. In some cases, even psychologists recommend this. In the modern world, with its rapidly changing demands and standards, you need to remain mobile and be ready for any changes, including when choosing a job. The main thing is not to remain inactive, not to succumb to fears and weaknesses, to boldly try everything new and decisively move towards your destiny. It is this attitude to life, including when choosing a profession, that will give young people the opportunity to independently create their own future and go through life their own way!

Thus, choosing a profession is an important and serious step in the life of every person, and for it to be correct, it is necessary to analyze many aspects: demand in the labor market, financial costs of education, one’s inclinations and abilities, to be aware of one’s obligations, but, in any case, this choice must be independent and deliberate.

Target: help to understand the attractive and unattractive sides of any profession, the possibility of mistakes and their consequences, and introduce the rules for choosing a profession correctly.

Task No. 1

Game "Optimists and Skeptics"

Each profession has its pros and cons. Analyze some professions (for example, military, teacher, entrepreneur). Write down the positive points in the “Optimists” column, and the negative ones in the “Skeptics” column, having first clarified the meaning of these words.

Has your understanding of these professions changed after the discussion? Why?

Let us clarify the meaning of the word “error”. If you cut a piece of bread crookedly, no one will consider it a serious mistake. But if the sole of a shoe is cut out, this already creates noticeable inconvenience and can be considered a mistake. If parts of a clock mechanism or computer are being made, then a deviation in size of a fraction of a millimeter will be a gross mistake.

You probably know that there are socially accepted acceptable limits for deviations from the requirements for people’s actions and the results of these actions. In engineering, these limits are called tolerances. But, in essence, there are tolerances wherever a person lives and acts.

What does “acceptable or unacceptable” mean in choosing a profession? The most important thing is to choose a profession so that your work in the future will be successful and bring you satisfaction.

There are two types of reasons that lead to the wrong choice of profession. This is, firstly, an incorrect attitude to various circumstances of choice (to the field of activity, to the advice and behavior of others), including insufficient independence in decision-making; secondly, lack of knowledge, experience, and awareness of the essential circumstances of this choice.

What do you think these mistakes are? Have you ever met adults who, in your opinion, made a mistake in choosing a profession? How do they live and how do they feel?

It is advisable to invite the guys to a discussion, during which, with your help, we can formulate the reasons for the errors:

prejudices;

"for company";

idealization;

passion for “surroundings”;

misconceptions:

a) to your own account;

b) about the profession.

There are prejudices in relation to a number of professions, which consist in the fact that certain types of activities are perceived as “not prestigious”. The list of these professions may change over one or more generations. Thus, the teaching profession, which was considered prestigious in our country for about half a century, moved into the category of “not prestigious” in the early 90s. Now her reputation is being restored.

Why do you think this happened? What professions do you consider “prestigious” and why? How do you generally understand the word “prestige”?

Quite often, graduates choose a profession “for the company.” Is this good or bad? It’s good when two friends have the same interests, inclinations and abilities for the same professional activity. It’s bad if only one of them is guided by this principle. In this case, he is usually severely disappointed, and after a long, sometimes painful search, he is forced to change his original choice. This is the best case scenario. At worst, he will spend the rest of his life doing something he doesn’t like.

Mistakes when choosing a profession

 

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