Career Planning for a Child

Parents envision a perfect life for their children. This often burdens the child with their unrealistic expectations. In such a competitive world, choosing a career path is a significant decision for a child and should be supported and funneled properly.

Proactive parents of today must first learn to respect every field of education and stop whirling around their children with their desires.The world is growing each day and with such cut-throat competitiveness out there, it’s imperative to be much evolved with our thinking.

Before learning how to help your children choose a career path, the foremost thing to understand is that parents can no longer be authoritarians but a guide. Even schools today have a counselling department that assists a child to realize what his interests are.

When to Start Planning?

Though parents start planning ever since their children start going to school, still it’s crucial to keep an eye on their interests and begin there. Nurture what they enjoy learning with a calm approach to assist them hone their skills.

Planning starts early,the sooner you realize their strengths, the more you can facilitate the children to practice and polish them. However, as the child grows his interests can change as well. So, always be there to listen and guide him patiently.

How can parents provide a better career guidance?

• Identify their Interests

How to know what interests your child? Establishing an open and mature communication and a strong bond with the child is the foremost step. Not only a parent, most of the times a child is unaware of his strengths as well. Healthy open discussions and listening to his thoughts, sometimes lets you know your child’s inherent potencies.

* Provide prospects to discover new things, learn and explore novel activities

* Enroll the child in extra-curricular activities

* Know the subjects that interests him more

* Talk to his teachers to understand him better

• Discuss What Career Choices are Available

With a much-changing world out there, parents need to evolve as well. It’s not just the doctors and engineers that constitute the world. Assessing the child’s natural abilities, his academic interests and performance and love of any extra-curricular activity, is key step that aids to make an informed decision.   

There are numerous potential career choices today, from a mundane job to exciting influencer’s world, machine learning, content creation, data analysis, artificial intelligence and much more.Discuss with the child his interests and suggest him ways to refine his skills. Support him getting information about what growth opportunities his chosen subject presents and whether it requires higher learning and understanding of the same.

Sometimes a child makes his career selection with peer pressure, in this case if parents feel the child is unclear and needs direction, then get in touch with a career counselor for professional guidance.

• Explore and Research about their Interests

Once the child recognizes what career option he wishes to pursue, the next step is to explore it further with thorough research.

A well informed and researched decision leads to the path of success. Help your child get in touch with professionals of his chosen field. Such professional advice will make him understand the opportunities that the field offers and what is the scope in the future. Understand the remuneration it will provide, as it should be enough to support your life. Find out whether the chosen course needs any further degree to fine-tune your knowledge on the same. 

• Patience, Guidance and Support

The decision is made, research is done, now is the time for implementation. Parents at this stage need to show a lot of support, with constant guidance and keep a lot of patience. Encourage your child to find his route to self- discovery. Perseverance plays a crucial role here. This journey of self-discovery may look challenging with a lot of highs & lows andat times the child might need persistent encouragement as well.Nonetheless, keep calm as the hard work always pays off.

Career planning for a child is certainly an imperative stage a parent goes through, however with proper planning and informed suggestions, assist your child make the right decision and choose a career option that is best suited for him.