How to be a Career Superhero

Just 20-30 years ago people used to get Bachelor’s Degree only and they were already considered as extremely strong potential job candidates. They got some job in the company and then even when being promoted they stayed within this company and demonstrated their loyalty that in a couple of years  was awarded with some bonuses.

Today getting a bachelor’s degree is not any incredible  achievement as it could be 20 years ago and you wouldn’t  surprise your potential employer by just showing your diploma ( no matter how hard it was for you to earn it). And at the same time it becomes harder and harder to find employees (especially young professionals) who stay in one company for more than 4-5 years.

A new trend demands that  if you want to be a better candidate on a job market and if you want to get a better high- paid job you need to have several degrees, have leadership experience, wide networking, some awards, achievements, certificates, and have a wide experience in working in different sectors of the industry. And all these requirements are applicable not to mature professionals who are in their 40’s but to the young professionals before 30. Sounds like you need to be a super hero if you want to survive in today’s world. 

So what do you need to do to have all these qualifications, to be such an experienced young professional who is self-motivated, creative, has time to work for all the degrees and experience, still has time for social and personal life? And what is more: how to enjoy everything you do?

Seems like solving a differential equation would be easier than trying to find a solution for this problem. But it’s not that hopeless. When you have a goal and have some options you can always find a solution. 

  1.     Education

As for bachelor’s, OK, go to school and enjoy the best 4 years in your life with all the parties and sleepless nights before finals. I think everybody should go through that to have that sort of experience. It is also useful because most of your network is going to be from your university. 

When you face a reality that you need to get an advanced degree like Master’s or MBA  you understand that you can’t spend another 2 years with your parents paying for you. Well, in this case today there are many options. There are online degrees or degrees with flexible schedule like evening or weekend classes and what is more- you can decide how many courses you take per semester so you can adapt the school to your own personal schedule. Even if you work on some entry level job you can attend school and still have personal life.

If you already have some diplomas but still think that you want to learn more then again Internet is going to help you. The new form of education that we have today is free online classes from best schools. Some universities offer free online courses that are open to public and don’t require any prerequisites or fees. All you need to have is curiosity and desire to learn something new. Stanford University, MIT, University of California are among them. Another good source for free online courses is the new coursera.com that becomes more and more popular and has students all over the world. They have more than 350 different courses in diverse areas. 

   2.      Certificates

Certificates require less time to obtain and are much cheaper but they can also boost you career and give you a broader knowledge. Among them are the popular certificates like CFA- for investment industry, CPA- for accountants, PMI- for Project management, HR Certification- for human resources and so on. All you need is to browse about your industry and you will see how many opportunities you have. And obtaining a certificate will not only give you some knowledge and professional credential but will also significantly increase your network in your specific industry which is very-very-very useful.   

 

3.      Network

As I said most of your network is coming from your University so it is better to be an active alumni and attend different reunions and meetings. Getting a Certificate usually means that you join some professional society like a CFA Institute or HR Certification Institute that also organize various networking events, meetings and study classes.  You shouldn’t miss any of those.  

Networking doesn’t mean that your goal on every event should be to collect as many business cards as possible or to disperse your own business cards. It is a complete waste of time. It is more like a random dating where you have only 5 minutes  to impress the other person. It is much better to find those people who are interesting for you due to their job, or project they work on so that you could ask them about it or share your thoughts and opinions. This way the person will get to know you better and this connection will be beneficial to both of you.

4.        Professional  Development

This part is pretty much close to networking but still should be mentioned separately.  Since Internet became an essential source of information we shouldn’t neglect it. Such social media like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn or Blogs can benefit you. Having an account on LinkedIn with updated information about your achievements and projects that you have worked on will create a good impression about your professionalism. It can also be a very useful tool for networking and finding right connections.

Twitter can be a useful tool to share what’s on your mind (mind your language though). You can share articles or news that have impressed you and create a discussion on them. 

To establish yourself as a professional with deep research qualities you can start your own blog where you can post some ideas or tips for others. Meanwhile you can also comment on other blogs that are interesting for you and this way you can get different opinions and experience. Blogging also helps to organize your own ideas and thoughts about different events and going through your old posts helps you to recall everything you have once learned but forgot.  By sharing your opinion and commenting you can also get new connections that might be useful for you.

But don’t forget that everything you post and say in Internet can be easily accessed by your employer, your friends or co-workers, so again, mind your language and be polite.

5.        Time management

To be able to accomplish everything I've mentioned above you should discipline yourself and not waste time on unnecessary stuff.  Just make a schedule and try to stick to it. But don’t plan to “Work on the project 10am-4pm”. You should have breaks and change of activity otherwise after 2 hours of work you will lose focus and the rest of the time spent on the project will be very unproductive. During the breaks you can check your Facebook, play with your cat or just watch some funny YouTube video. But this is only during the break.  And don’t plan that you will write 10 pages of research in one day. Be realistic.