Explore Your Career as If You were Doing a Research Project

Like many graduate students, after two or three years in school, I find myself more prepared for research projects than exploring careers. The two seemingly distinct tasks – exploring careers and doing research – actually share a lot of commonalities. In a recent article from Inside Higher Ed, Tina Solvic, Program Manager of Graduate Career Education at the University of Texas at Austin, suggests that the process of investigating one’s career opportunities and conducting a research project is similar by nature – they are both long-term processes requiring information collection, analysis, and assessment before findings or discoveries surface.

One thing I learned by reading this article is how to transfer my experience and skills from my graduate training to researching my career through its step-by-step guide. The article also includes tools and resources to help one start their career research project. Read the full article here.

Inside Higher Ed is a free daily news website for people who work in higher education. Breaking news, lively commentary, and thousands of job postings bring more than 1.2 million people to the site each month. One of its columns – Carpe Careers features career-related advice and opinions specifically for doctoral students.

 

Image by ar130405 from Pixabay

By Damiao Zoe Xu
Damiao Zoe Xu Graduate Assistant, Graduate Student and Postdoc Career Programs and Services (She/Her/Hers)