Exploring career paths is critical for successfully navigating the professional world. Research can help you explore various career paths, excel in interviews, and empower decisions. When exploring career paths, it is essential to look at a variety of sources, statistics, and stories. Below you will find four steps in researching career paths.

1. Identify the field you are interested in. While you might set on a specific career, it is important to look broader as well. You never know what other opportunities there might be within the field. It is important to be aware of all opportunities that might be available. Once you identify several possible opportunities, you can explore better details.
2. Understand the education and experience needed. It is critical to understand what educational background and experience you will need to pursue a certain field. College is expensive, so knowing which degree will provide the most opportunities in your field will allow you to make a well-informed decision. Moreover, being able to explore different paths of experiences is critical to securing your dream job.
3. Research future projections and statistics. Knowledge is key in being successful. By visiting the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, you can see future job projections. This helps prepare you for how competitive the field might be and the job outlook. Additional statistics to focus on are salary and turnover rate.
4. Stay current on trends and research. Every field is constantly changing and growing. Thus, staying current on hot topics, trends, and related research is critical to success. Consider joining groups and organizations to stay current. Many memberships come with journal subscriptions. These are critical to further learning the current topics in the field.
5. Starting working on at least one hard skill and one soft skill that you can use on your new job. One that you never overdo is practicing excellent customer service.  It translates in providing great services in your team and to other teams across the organization.  For your hard skill, you can improve at least one computer technology skills, it would go a long way.

Research is an investment in your future career. By extending your knowledge of the field, you can make stronger decisions in the future. This can also lead to less burnout, time wasted, and a lower turnover rate. Further, this knowledge will help in future networking events and goal setting.

Believe & Inspire is committed to helping you achieve your goals through our programs. In our programs, you can learn more specifically about career research and other steps you can take to achieve your goals. You can find more information on our website under programs.