- •Introduction
- •1. How do you choose a career?
- •1.1. “Working” vocabulary
- •1.2. Choosing a career
- •Choosing a career
- •1.3. Career and personality
- •What is Your Career Personality?
- •Does My Personality Match this Career?
- •1.4. The 10 top steps for choosing a career
- •The 10 top steps for choosing a career
- •1. Begin with your values.
- •2. Identify your skills and talents.
- •3. Identify your preferences.
- •4. Experiment.
- •5. Become broadly literate.
- •6. In your first job, opt for experience first, money second.
- •7. Aim for a job in which you can become 110% committed.
- •8. Build your lifestyle around your income, not your expectations.
- •9. Invest five percent of your time, energy, and money into furthering your career.
- •10. Be willing to change and adapt.
- •1.5. Revision
- •2. Looking for a job
- •2.1. Work
- •2.3. Job search methods
- •Job search methods
- •2.4. Experience first, money second
- •My life as an intern
- •2.5. Revision
- •3. Applying for a job
- •3.1. Looking for and applying for a job
- •3.2. Want ads
- •3.3. How does a selection process go?
- •The Selection Process
- •Interview...
- •3.4. Getting ready for a job interview
- •Curriculum vitae
- •Interests
- •Personal statement
- •Covering letter
- •Mega Video Store requires trainee manager
- •16, London road,
- •23, High Road,
- •Planning
- •Writing
- •Checking
- •3.5. A job interview
- •3.6. Getting and keeping a job
- •3.7. Revision
- •4. At work
- •4.1. Career and promotion
- •One man's career
- •Being busy
- •Other idioms connected with work
- •During your working life
- •4.2. Colleagues and routines
- •Colleagues
- •Daily work routines
- •During the day (different work-patterns)
- •Types of work
- •4.3. Revision
- •5. The everchanging workplace
- •5.1. Revolution in the workplace
- •Recent changes in the world of work
- •Help wanted
- •5.2. The changing workplace
- •What makes a good workplace?
- •The Changing Workplace
- •5.3. Revision
- •6. Gender issues in the workplace
- •6.1. Men vs women
- •6.2. Gender stereotypes at work
- •6.3. Inequality at work
- •Inequality at work
- •6 .4. Gender discrimination in the workplace and at home
- •6.5. Balancing home and work
- •Balancing home and work
- •Value of housework
- •A Cinderella story
- •6.6. Revision
- •7. Check yourself
- •2. Write some collocations or brainstorm some related topics 1. Write a definition
- •Vocabulary Word
- •3. Use the word in a sentence or question 4. Recall a sentence with the word from the text.
- •Useful phrases
- •Writing a Summary Conflicting interests
- •Understanding the task
- •Deciding what is important
- •Answering questions to write a summary
- •Summarising a paragraph
- •Cutting out unnecessary information
- •6. Understanding the task
- •7. Planning
- •8. Writing
- •9. Checking
- •Presentation Signpost Expressions
- •Introducing the topic
- •Presentations. Structure and Useful Phrases
- •Introduction
- •Interpreting information
- •Discourse markers in speech and in writing
9. Invest five percent of your time, energy, and money into furthering your career.
In terms of a forty-hour week, that's only two hours per week. The point is, you cannot rely on your employer to spoon-feed you. Employers today are oriented towards immediate returns on their dollar. They will invest in you only when they can see an immediate or relatively quick expensive benefit, or when they see extraordinary potential. Better to not count on either. Dedicate yourself to getting ahead by keeping ahead, and you do that by controlling the one thing you can control: your dedication to being the best that you can be.
10. Be willing to change and adapt.
If you re-read the preceding steps in this list, you'll note an absence (refreshing, we hope) of emphasis upon goal-setting and a substitution instead, of words like "values", "skills", "talents", and "preferences". It's not that goals aren't useful, but rather that they should emerge naturally from these other factors and, even though you may write them down and paste them on your mirror, they should not obscure the need to be willing to change and adapt to new conditions, your own growth, and developing opportunities. The distinction here is between "direction" and "plan". An ant has a direction, but not a plan. The ant knows where it wants to go and is willing to turn around, back up, and change course in order to get there. But the ant hasn't written it down, posted it on a bulletin board, or gained concurrence from all the other ants. The ant just knows, with absolute certainty, the general direction in which it's heading and that it WILL get there. That's what modern day career direction is all about.
Task 3. True or False? Prove your choice with the lines from the text.
1. Nowadays the career choice is quite narrow and thus easy to make. |
T/F |
2. You’ll enjoy your work only if it matches your personal values. |
T/F |
3. One usually enjoys doing the activities he can do well. |
T/F |
4. Psychometric questionnaires can help you choose a career. |
T/F |
5. There’s no use trying different kinds of jobs before you make your final choice. |
T/F |
6. Volunteering for a job can test your career preferences. |
T/F |
7. You cannot learn much about a career unless you try it. |
T/F |
8. If you are a specialist, you risk becoming useless. |
T/F |
9. If you are new to the job market, you should look for a high initial salary. |
T/F |
10. Most employers are eager to invest in their employees. |
T/F |
11. Your ability to change and adapt is far more important than goal-setting. |
T/F |
Task 4. Choose one of the expressions below and complete the Vocabulary Word Map (see Appendix 2):
tunnel vision
generalist
specialist
to turn smb on
to be apt to do smth
the job market
to scuttle smth
work experience
to spoon-feed
goal-setting
Task 5. Find another way to express the same idea using your active vocabulary.
Deciding what profession you’d like to have for the biggest part of your life is crucial.
An American person usually changes his/her profession several times before he/she is retired.
A career is something that occupies every day of your life.
Try to find a career that will allow you to do what you like and what you can do well.
I disapprove of people who can be happy only if they have a lot of money.
Never base your career choice on the opinions and advice of people around you.
It’s wrong to think that you can do nothing about your future.
Money is far from being everything one needs to be happy.
Task 6. Having a closer look.
For Steps 1-3, recall related ideas from the previous texts.
For Step 4, answer the questions: Do you agree that it pays to volunteer and work without being paid? Would you ever volunteer to perform a job?
What type of worker mentioned in Step 5 is valued nowadays according to the author’s opinion? What could you personally do to become a generalist/specialist?
In your career search, will you follow the author’s advice given in Step 6? Why (not)?
Comment on the ideas in Steps 7 and 8.
Are you ready to invest time, energy and money into furthering your career, as suggested in Step 9? Or do you consider it useless?
In Step 10, what does the example with an ant reveal?
Task 7. Paraphrase the underlined vocabulary units in the text in the written form. Make up 5 fresh-context sentences with the word combinations you like most.
SPEAKING
Task 8. Prepare a lecture “THE _______ TOP STEPS FOR CHOOSING A CAREER” to present in class. You are a career advisor delivering a lecture on choosing a career for high school students and their parents. As resources for this work use the texts you have read in this book, search the Internet, interview other people for dos and don’ts, share your personal experience. Remember to mention the resources before you start your presentation and use your active vocabulary.