Life after the Leaving Cert: Where do you start?

Not having a clue what you want to do after the Leaving Cert is not unusual. Deciding what you want to do with the rest of your life at 18 is a totally false dilemma.

Nobody, including myself at 60 years-of-age, knows what the next three to five years is going to bring. Both you as an 18 year-old, and I at 60 go through the exact same process to determine the future direction of our career paths. We can both look at our life experiences to date, our interests and aptitudes, our likes and dislikes, the opportunities that our particular financial and personal circumstances offer us, and explore all of the various options open to us following the end of the academic year in June 2015. The only difference between us is that I have more clues buried in my life journey to date than you have.

You will most likely engage in this process of reflection and decision-making regarding your career path on at least 15-20 occasions between now and the time when you become physically incapable of engaging in any meaningful career activity – which may be up to 70 years away in your case.

Career choices recur over your lifetime. The options open to you at the end of your second-level education are the first significant career choices you will have to reflect on, but they are in no way life-determining or shaping.

Therefore do not get anxious or distressed by this process now, as you will do it over and over again throughout your life.

The decision you will eventually come to over the coming months will simply determine what you will commit yourself to for the next year, or in the case of college choices, three to four years at a maximum.

So it is totally normal and rational to tell your guidance counsellor that you have no idea at the moment what to do with yourself once you receive your Leaving Certificate from your principal on August 12th next.

The clues to your future are buried in your past

Having said that, there are a wide range of clues embedded in your life story to date which can help you determine the next appropriate step in your career journey. Your own unique life experience advances daily as you express yourself in your personal, educational, sporting, musical, social and vocational, life.

To make sense of it and relate it to the choices which you are currently facing, you need to sit down and look at the jigsaw pieces of your life to date. The trick is to put them all together, to see if there is any pattern or linking themes among them.

We all have a wide range of interests, hobbies, skills, aptitudes and achievements, both academic and personal. Can you put the facts about yourself together to see what picture may emerge?

What do you enjoy doing in your personal life? Are you an outdoor type who loves the freedom of being in the open air? Are you good with people and do you enjoy helping or caring for them? Alternatively, you may enjoy making things or taking them apart to see how they work. Are you entrepreneurial, having bought and sold things among your friends and made a profit in the process? Do you like regular routine and enjoy organising your room so it is neat and tidy, where you can find anything you want at a moment’s notice? The answers give you clues to your future career journey.

In your school life there is another set of clues going back to when you first entered the education system as a four or five-year-old.

What are your favourite subjects in school, which you have always enjoyed and where you have done well in school exams or Junior Certificate/GCSEs?

Are they language subjects, the sciences, business, technological subjects, the creative arts, music, etc? If you took any interest inventories in recent years to help you choose Leaving Cert subjects they may indicate career or course areas you had a stronger interest in than others.

You also probably took a set of aptitude tests either at the end of Junior Cert year or Transition Year. Did they indicate you were strong in numerical, linguistic, abstract, mechanical, organisational reasoning, etc? This is a particularly important clue. Genetics or family interests may also come into it. Is there any particular pattern within your own family, on either side, which might give a clue about your own career direction?

Have you been involved in a particular area by helping out at home or in a family business or profession? Many people find themselves following a family direction, such as politics, farming or business.

Take out a sheet of paper and go down through the questions posed here, write down any relevant answers or information that arises. When you have finished your list of facts about yourself, look to see if there is any pattern to it. You may see a theme or possible area of interest emerge, which will inform your research in the months ahead.

Remember you are not looking for any blinding flash of inspiration which will reveal the pattern of your entire working life. You are simply looking for a strong indication of what might be the best next step in your life journey. If you get that one right, it will consolidate the pattern and help you to take the next step in a few years time, after you complete the option you choose.

Your ultimate decision may be to apply for a college place this September, or to volunteer to work for a charity abroad for a year, or to do something completely different. The choice is yours and only you can know what is right for you.

There are a number of excellent websites to help. To get an insight into the nature of the changing world of work and the evolving roles in different sectors of the economy go to careersportal.ie. It has an excellent interest inventory and personality profiler which may help you clarify your emerging picture of yourself by taking one or both tests.

When you have narrowed down your choices to a small number of course areas you should research every single course available in Ireland on qualifax.ie, in the UK and Northern Ireland at ucas.com, and in continental Europe at eunicas.ie .

Brian Mooney's new book Your Career Journey Starts Here is published by Edco, available from bookshops or from revisewise.ie.