Page 352 - Keys To Community College Success

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FIND WORK THAT COMBINES EARNINGS
AND FULFILLMENT

Complete the following on paper or in digital format.

Investigate which jobs in your areas of interest can earn you what you need. Answer the following questions:
1. What are your most signif cant interests and skills?
2. What are three possible careers you feel would suit your interests and skills?
3. Identify three people you could talk to who work in, or know about, any of these careers. For each, write down
the name, career, and contact information.
4. Contact an individual from the list to set up an informational interview. Note: Refer to “Informational Interviews
and the Hidden Job Market” in this chapter for assistance.
5. Develop a list of questions to ask the individual about his or her job, making sure to focus on the question of how
to balance passion and earnings. Save the list on a computer and print it.
6. Attend the informational interview, taking notes on your printed list. Send a follow-up thank you note. If you can,
repeat the informational interview process with the other two people.

devices away completely so you are not tempted to use them. Offer a confident hand-
shake. Make eye contact. Show your integrity by speaking honestly about yourself.
After the interview, no matter what the outcome, follow up right away with a formal
but pleasant thank you note.
Being on time to your interview makes a positive impression—and being late will
almost certainly be held against you. Finally, if you do not consider being late a sign of
disrespect, remember that your interviewer may not agree.

HOW CAN YOU CONTINUE TO GROW
as a risk taker and thinker?

Much as finding a job is the beginning of your career adventure, finishing this course is
the beginning of your life as a calculated risk taker and successfully intelligent learner.
How can you stay motivated to keep thinking and risking? Earlier in this text, you may
have completed a self-assessment to examine your levels of development in 20 charac-
teristics that promote action and productive risks. According to Sternberg, successfully
intelligent people: 9
1. Motivate themselves. They make things happen, spurred on by a desire to succeed
and a love of what they are doing. They rarely need others to tell them what to do.
2. Learn to control their impulses. Instead of going with their first quick response,
they sit with a question or problem. They take time to let ideas surface before
making a decision.
12 3. Know when to persevere. When the reward is worth the effort, they push past
CHAPTER 314 frustration and stay on course. They also recognize when they’ve hit a dead end

and shift gears in response.