Careering

Students can prepare for their future careers by first reflecting on their past

Dustin Edwards and Frederick Mills

Every fall at the University of Alberta, roughly 500 second-year engineering students enrol in ENGG 299: Introduction to Co-operative Education. This course is a mandatory, for-credit “bootcamp” designed to help students develop their job-ready skills in preparation for their first work placement. But this course isn’t just about getting a first job. It is also a rare opportunity for students to pause and think about what it will take to succeed in the rest of their careers.

How can work-integrated learning (WIL) professionals prepare and empower students to enter their work placements successfully, and also feel ready and excited for the twists, turns and lifelong growth that will define their future careers? Bringing the concept of career mindsets directly into the resume preparation process can be an important first step.

A career mindset means that students aren’t just thinking about what it will take to get their next job. They are thinking about who they already are, and who they might grow to become over the course of their working lives.

However, career mindsets are not just forward looking. For early stage WIL students, developing a career mindset can involve reflecting on their work histories, achievements, interests and skills. Students feel empowered knowing that they have already been accumulating experiences that will contribute to their careers, while employers will be better able to recognize students’ potential. “You didn’t just make pizzas,” we recently told one of our students, who was struggling to identify the value of their past employment experiences. “What did you really do?”

Using resumes as a tool for career mindset development

Nearly 40 years of scholarship has consistently demonstrated the relationship between lifelong learning, intellectual agility, motivation, and personal and professional success (Elliot & Dweck, 1988; Dweck, 2008; Yeager & Dweck, 2012). A recent study predicted that 85% of jobs that will exist in 2030 have not yet been invented (Institute for the Future, 2017). Innovation, growth and flexibility are the watchwords of labour markets that are in continuous flux.

Graduates in engineering, as in many other professions, need career mindsets centred on flexibility, resilience and creativity. Academic training alone can’t guarantee the trajectories of their future careers. Students need to be ready to leverage skills that may not seem immediately obvious, and practise seeing themselves as adaptable lifelong learners who will only continue to grow.

Co-op students implicitly understand this. As well as classroom training in math, mechanics and materials testing, students complete 20 months of paid work experience that will require them to try different jobs and work with different teams, building a variety of skills for the long term. Students recognize that they will need to be capable and future-oriented, with an existing slate of skills and the potential to develop further.

Through the resume review process in ENGG 299, we take this implicit understanding of the importance of career mindsets and make it explicit. How do we do this?

1. Stressing the importance of transferable skills

In contrast to technical skills, transferable skills can be defined as those skills that are job related, but not job specific (Chadha & Lewis, 2006). For our young pizza chef, creating a first-rate resume involved asking them to think holistically about what transferable skills they gained from that role. Knowing how many pepperonis go on an extra-large pizza pie was secondary to the sound communication and teamwork skills, time management and safety knowledge required to do the job well. We invite students to consider their past experiences and accomplishments through the prism of transferable skills.

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The benefits to students and employers are manifold. For students, the language of transferable skills is empowering and future-focused, and this mindset will serve them long after they graduate. It also acts as a potent tonic against imposter syndrome, self-doubt and feelings of unworthiness. For employers and HR professionals, resumes that use statements and action verbs grounded in the syntax of transferable skills allow those professionals to better understand students’ experiences, their potential and the value they could bring to a position.

If the jobs of tomorrow have truly not yet been invented, an emphasis on transferable skills in resume writing for early-stage WIL students is critical. This emphasis helps students secure meaningful co-op positions now, develop and enhance transferable skills for later, and gain the invaluable technical knowledge necessary to thrive in the job market of the future.

2. Considering graduate attributes

For our early stage WIL students, a resume that effectively communicates transferable skills is a must. Yet, not all transferable skills are created equal. Students need to be savvy about which skills to prioritize in order to succeed in their desired field. Engineers Canada cites the importance of lifelong learning and professional development, equity, and economics and project management for engineering students. To thrive as engineers or beyond, students need to recognize when they already have these skills and the necessity of developing them further.

The ENGG 299 resume exercise is a key place to help students build this career mindset. As they prepare their resumes, we ask students first to consider the attributes and skills that engineering graduates need. These often go beyond technical skills for specific jobs and instead get at the qualities required to succeed in life-long careers. Students identify attributes such as flexibility, leadership, intercultural understanding and business acumen. Then, we ask them to identify the attributes and skills they already have, and those that need further development.

“Students need to be savvy about which skills to prioritize in order to succeed in their desired field.”

This approach of embedding career mindsets into resume writing can also work in other fields, as students can articulate where they have been and how this relates to what it takes to succeed in their desired careers.

Conclusion

The novelist and poet George Eliot once purportedly quipped, “It is never too late to be what you might have been.” With apologies to Ms. Eliot, it is also never too late to be what you already have been. You simply need to realize it.

Career and growth mindsets can help make this realization manifest. For students at the start of their professional journeys, with seemingly little relevant experience, having a career mindset will not only help them secure their first professional job, but also prepare them for life-long growth and adaptability. By refracting their past work experience through a career mindset lens, students can identify what skills they have and in what areas their skills could be further developed. By thinking in terms of transferable skills and graduate attributes, students can focus on building career trajectories that embrace lifelong learning informed not only by where they would like to go but by where they have already been.

The resume is a key site where career professionals can nurture career mindsets in students. Our once pizza chef may never make another pizza. But a career mindset will help them re-interpret that position, and use it as a springboard to think about themself as the kind of person who made the most of every opportunity, and never ceased developing the skills that would see them through their whole career.

Dustin Edwards, MEd, is an Employer Relationship Manager in the Faculty of Engineering at the University of Alberta. He has been the instructor for ENGG 299 for the past three years while working in co-operative education, and has been involved in student engagement through a variety of roles over the course of his 10-year career at the University of Alberta.

Frederick Mills, MA, is a Program Advisor in the Faculty of Engineering at the University of Alberta. He has worked for the past four years in the fields of employment readiness training and work integrated learning.

An understanding of one’s needs at work, and how these may differ across individuals, may help foster more positive working relationships

K. Jessica Van Vliet and José F. Domene

At its core, most types of work involve interpersonal relationships. How people relate to their co-workers may reflect patterns of interpersonal relating that show up in other areas of people’s lives. Paul Gilbert (2009), one of the world’s leading experts on compassion, coined the term social mentalities as a rough way of classifying people’s ways of social relating. Social mentalities are types of mindsets that influence a person’s thoughts, feelings and behaviours, and that motivate people to act in particular ways toward other people. Among the core social mentalities identified by Gilbert are care giving, care seeking, competition and co-operation. After briefly summarizing Gilbert’s (1992) descriptions of these mentalities, we discuss the potential implications of social mentalities on work and career.

Social mentalities

Care giving: This mentality is characterized by a strong motivation to nurture other people’s growth and development. Feelings of pleasure and contentment come from supporting the well-being of others. With this mentality, a person is sensitive to other people’s distress and responds with caring and compassion. Providing others with comfort and protection in the face of potential harm may be a significant source of personal satisfaction.

Care seeking: On the flip side of care giving is care seeking. A person coming from this mentality may show an intense need for nurturance and protection from others. Anxiety, depression and other forms of distress may result from not having support close at hand. When support is available, the individual may experience a greater sense of security and contentment; from this place of increased security, a person is better able to focus on other goals.

Competition: This mentality is marked by a person’s preoccupation with how they rank in relation to other people. From this mentality, a person attends closely to signals of inferiority/superiority and winning/losing. Their assessment of where they stand in relation to others may at times lead to behaviours aimed at domination (i.e. emerging “on top” or winning). Alternatively, in order to avoid being attacked or rejected, a person may attempt to appease individuals who are regarded as being more powerful. The competition mentality is associated with a range of emotions, from anger, anxiety and resentment, to the excitement of winning.

 Co-operation: In contrast to competition, this mentality is concerned not with issues of social standing but with mutual trust, respect, belonging, sharing and appreciation. These qualities facilitate collaborative interactions aimed at achieving group goals. As with care giving, expressions of caring may be present. However, with co-operation, caring is typically mutual and helps to create a friendly, enjoyable work environment that promotes team success.

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Implications for career development

When applied to work and career, an understanding of social mentalities can be helpful both to individuals and to the organization as a whole. Social mentalities may provide a useful framework for informing career-related decisions. For example, a person who is highly motivated by a care-giving mentality might actively seek out opportunities to foster the growth of junior colleagues. A person with a competitive mentality might choose to work in an organization where competing for promotion and recognition is highly valued and encouraged. At an organizational level, awareness of the social mentalities that motivate different workers can help organizations better respond to workers’ needs and preferences. In addition, an understanding of how social mentalities influence social dynamics within the workplace may be used to enhance workplace culture.

Although most research on social mentalities has been in the area of mental health, in our program of research at the University of Alberta and the University of Calgary, we have been exploring how social mentalities may influence people’s career development and their experience of work. In one recent study where we qualitatively explored adults’ experiences of workplace caring, caring in the workplace had different meanings depending upon whether a person’s focus was on co-operation versus care giving and care seeking. For instance, someone coming from a care-seeking mentality might interpret caring as their supervisor’s commitment to the worker’s growth and development, or as the emotional availability of co-workers in times of personal distress. From other workers’ perspectives, caring might be more about friendly conversations and enjoyable social activities that serve co-operative goals.

In other words, when it comes to caring in the workplace, one size does not fit all. An understanding of one’s needs for caring at work, and how the meaning of workplace caring may differ across individuals, may help foster more positive working relationships. For organizations that strive to create a more caring work environment, it is important to consider what forms of caring would be beneficial, and for whom.

“In other words, when it comes to caring in the workplace, one size does not fit all.”

We are currently in the process of developing a questionnaire to measure people’s social mentalities in the context of work, along with a questionnaire designed to tap into people’s perceptions of the social mentalities in their workplace. The questionnaires may contribute to a deeper understanding of the influence of social mentalities on career development and well-being. In the meantime, we offer the following questions that career practitioners may find useful in discussing social mentalities with clients and stimulating their thinking about how this concept may relate to their careers:

• Thinking about the four social mentalities, which mentalities seem to best describe me when it comes to how I relate to other people in my workplace?
• How important is each mentality to me?
• For those mentalities that reflect who I am or want to be, how does my workplace support me?
• If there seems to be a mismatch between my preferred social mentalities and my workplace, what changes can I make in my own life/career or in my workplace?

It is also important to recognize that social mentalities can be quite fluid. They may become more or less active, depending upon the context. For example, someone may tend toward a co-operative mentality in working with peers but function from more of a care-seeking mentality with their supervisor. The person’s stage of career might also be relevant, with care seeking being more present early in one’s career, and care giving rising in importance in the later stages of career development. As we continue to learn more about how social mentalities influence work and career, workers and their supervisors may become better positioned to contribute to a healthy and harmonious work environment.

Dr. K. Jessica Van Vliet (jvanvliet@ualberta.ca) is a Registered Psychologist and Professor of Counselling Psychology at the University of Alberta. She has spent several years researching compassion in a variety of life domains. Most recently, she has extended her interest in compassion to the context of the workplace.

Dr. José Domene (jfdomene@ucalgary.ca), Registered Psychologist and Professor of Counselling Psychology at the University of Calgary, has gained an international reputation for his career development research, which focuses particularly on the relational contexts of career.

Dinuka Gunaratne, Trevor Johnson and Thomas Feth

There are many reasons students choose to pursue graduate education. Some pursue advanced degrees as an avenue for cultivating their curiosity, interests and gaining knowledge. There are also those with a clear sense of direction who view graduate school as a means to success in a particular career. Others enter graduate school to find this direction.

However, students without clear goals are still expected to achieve, accomplish and produce as much as possible to compete with their peers. For this reason, success in academia quickly becomes the measure of success for a great number of students. Maintaining high grades, publishing research, and receiving scholarships and funding are all measures one could use to determine if they are succeeding. This degree-first (or credential-first) mindset is most often inadequate in assisting students once graduate school is over or nearing completion. The idea that there are specific “hoops” to jump through to complete a career – the same way that there are certain requirements when completing a degree – plagues the minds of many graduate students.

A more proactive way of viewing one’s career is understanding that a career is made up of opportunities and experiences and is not confined to a formula. One degree can branch off into many career options, all requiring different assortments of the skills and strengths used to complete a graduate degree. This type of mindset allows for more rapid acclimatization to change, uncertainty and disruption – terms that have become all too familiar in our current reality.

As a student, cultivating a positive outlook on one’s career can be energizing and give purpose to projects and tasks. This involves exploring mindsets through the lens of growth and development, in contrast to being fixed to the completion of standardized tasks (departmental seminars, candidacy exams, thesis defences, etc.). What many struggling graduate students need is support in cultivating a mindset that focuses on their career after graduate school in tandem with the completion of their degree program.

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When guiding graduate students through their career development, exploring mindsets can be a helpful first step. Connecting and unearthing where they currently are can give insights into whether a student is ready to take action and dive deeper into strategizing and planning for their future. With the complexities that come with academia, a student’s sense of self could conflict with the expectations around them. Many graduate students struggle with imposter syndrome and deep levels of anxiety around what it means to be successful.

One of the best ways to support these states of mind is to slowly introduce students to frameworks that situate and engage them in future possibilities. Design thinking mindsets introduced by Bill Burnett and Dave Evans at Stanford are examples of resources designed to encourage proactive thinking.

Cultivating curiosity

Curiosity is the building block of scholarship. Due to the very specific and niche nature of an academic investigation, students can lose perspective and the overall curiosity for their surroundings. We can remind students that it is their curiosity that probably got them into academia. This trait can be cultivated to encourage them to be more curious about career possibilities and help usher in connections, networks and career options.

Reframing the student mindset

When graduate students are faced with barriers, supporting them to reframe their thinking can help get them unstuck and move forward with confidence. For example, if a student is questioning their entry into graduate education, helping that student take part in a positive dialogue on the possibilities open to them can go a long way. Students have access to a variety of resources and support while in school. Simply being a student can be a powerful tool to connect with people as many professionals are open to supporting and connecting with students to help grow their network.

Taking action and working together

Taking the initiative to put things into practice is a core tenant of a design mindset. It is also incredibly useful when navigating the uncertainty that comes with graduate school and a career. Taking action to explore career possibilities while in graduate school can alleviate the sense of loss that is felt when thinking about what comes next. Students have many opportunities to take advantage of professional development programming, extracurricular and work-integrated learning opportunities offered by their departments, unit and university. Are they thinking about pursuing consulting as a career? Encourage their attendance at a student-run workshop connecting them to consultants. Do they want to build their communication and leadership skills? Maybe they can run for the board of a student group they are interested in. Taking advantage of active engagement opportunities is paramount to building skills that can last a lifetime.

Additionally, collaborative efforts often lead to better outcomes. Graduate education can be highly competitive and sometimes cause the dysfunctional belief that “I have to do everything on my own to be successful.” Exploring career next steps and connecting and collaborating with colleagues, peers, staff and faculty can lead to generating many options and opportunities for exploration. Collaboration also creates hope and alleviates the well-documented loneliness felt throughout many students’ graduate education.

Putting it into practice and acknowledging the time commitment

 To illustrate the aforementioned mindsets: imagine a student who is feeling lost as to what they can do after graduate school. They have lost their original excitement and energy for their area of study and are under pressure to complete the degree and figure out career next steps. They are also worried that being in graduate school has taken them too far away from the working world and that employers might think they are overqualified and under-experienced for work. Rekindling their curiosity, reframing their obstacles as opportunities, brainstorming and collaborating on actionable next steps could be transformative for this student. Grounding them through the process should help them navigate many of the uncertainties and challenges that will come along the way.

Every endeavour takes time and is a process. Acknowledging this can help reduce the levels of urgency and frustration of wanting immediate results. Helping a student to “trust the process” may take some time and effort, but when it becomes a part of the mindset, it allows you to know that failures along the way are not detrimental to progress. They can be powerful opportunities to learn and chart a new path forward.

Clair R, Gordon M, Kroon M, Reilly C. (2021 Jan 27) The effects of social isolation on well-being and life satisfaction during pandemic. Humanities and Social Sciences Communications. 8, 28. https://doi.org/10.1057/s41599-021-00710-3.

Dinuka Gunaratne is the Director of the Centre for Graduate Professional Development (CGPD) at the University of Toronto. Over the past 14 years, he has worked at six post-secondary institutions across Canada in various roles including in student services, experiential and work-integrated learning, and graduate student career and professional development.

Trevor Johnson is a graduate student in environmental chemistry at the University of Alberta. He worked as a career educator at the University of Alberta Career Centre for over three years during his studies and has helped numerous students develop their personal profiles, job search and plan for their careers.

Thomas Feth is a law student at the University of Alberta Faculty of Law. He previously worked for the University of Alberta Career Centre in career education and currently volunteers as a Youth Employment Mentor with Boys & Girls Clubs Big Brothers Big Sisters of Edmonton & Area.

The negative stories clients tell themselves can prevent them from engaging in impactful job search activities like networking

Michelle Schafer

As I embarked on my morning run one day, I was struck by how beautiful the sky was, with the sun starting to peek through the network of clouds. We all have our own network – people who surround us from all aspects of our lives. Family, friends, co-workers, fellow parents at our kids’ schools and activities, people we met while taking a course or volunteering. For your clients looking for their next fulfilling job, now is the time to lean on this network of support. As we know, building (and tapping into) relationships with others is the most impactful job search activity, and the one to devote the most energy to.

Cognitively, clients will tell me they understand the return on their investment of time is the greatest with networking activities, and yet just thinking of engaging with others creates anxiety. Some clients will lean heavily on limiting beliefs – stories they create for themselves that are founded on assumptions, self-judgments and past experiences. These negative “stories” cause them to believe they can’t network, or won’t be successful at it, so they don’t even try. And in this pandemic, this narrative has taken centre stage.

“People are too busy / stressed in this pandemic to want to help, so they will probably say no.”

“Networking isn’t effective over video.”

“I don’t have much of a network, so I have no one to ask.”

How would you know one of your clients has a limiting belief that is preventing them from moving forward in their search? These observations may sound familiar:

• They have a pattern of making excuses when you follow up on networking progress
• They resist suggestions to pursue senior-level contacts and prefer to only reach out to contacts at a lower level in the organization
• They struggle with assembling a list of potential contacts who could help
• They have “catch-up” conversations with contacts with no “ask” for further assistance

The truth is, most people do want to help. They remember what it was like to look for work and they love talking about themselves. And, as we’ve found through the pandemic, it’s very possible to build good connections over video – and networking can even be easier in a virtual format. It takes courage to reach out, but if you don’t ask, you don’t receive!

While a positive mindset can help a client move forward in a job search, limiting beliefs will hold a client back, create anxiety or keep them “stuck.” These beliefs can wield a lot of power – and the more a client’s limiting beliefs are driving their job search, the more they will be challenged with articulating their achievements, seeing the possibilities (versus roadblocks) and reaching out for help.

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How can you help clients move past these beliefs, embrace a new mindset and create new “stories” that will lead to job search success?

• Remind your client of the importance of networking, and that it is an accepted (and expected) job search activity. This is especially true if they need to find new work quickly. Networking activities should comprise over 80% of a job search. A simple request to ask someone to get a resume into the hands of a decision-maker can be a “way in” to get an interview.
• Reframe the word “networking”: For some, just hearing the word is anxiety-inducing, and they may feel the idea of networking is challenging to navigate. Encourage the client to have “informational interviews” versus “networking conversations.” With these interviews, clients can explore possibilities and get curious about an organization and how their skills and experience fit.  A new name can make the activity less daunting and more accessible.
• Encourage clients to follow up with network contacts: Two weeks from the time of the first contact is a reasonable timeframe. A no response does not mean the person doesn’t want to help – they may just be busy with projects, away on vacation or immersed in other work. A “nudge” to let the person know you are still interested to meet may be a helpful reminder.
• Explore why the client struggles with asking for help: There may be underlying shame and fear from their job loss that lurks beneath their resistance to reach out. You can help them unpack these feelings and create a new narrative for themselves, or refer them to professional resources. Asking for help is a sign of strength and shows initiative.
• Help clients develop language for meeting requests so they get noticed: An email request can briefly capture who the client is and the value they can offer, how the person can help (e.g. information about a new career path, perspective on challenges and opportunities within a specific sector) and potential dates to meet make it easier for the client to get noticed and receive a response.
• Ask clients what would open up for them if they reached out to a senior-level resource, and what would they be closed off from if they did not. You can help your client see the possibilities, and what they won’t get a chance to experience if they decide not to try.

Reaching out has its benefits. In the past few months, two people from my network reached out to see if I had contacts at the companies they applied to. As newcomers to Canada, they may have experienced some discomfort as they worked to establish their networks in a new country. I was able to connect them with the respective hiring managers, and both candidates got interviews and were later hired.

Like the clouds we admire on a sunny day, these clients were surrounded by a supportive network. They knew people were close by to help and reached out to ask, even though it was uncomfortable to do so.  You can play a pivotal role to help your clients move past their limiting beliefs, embrace a new mindset and achieve job search success.

Michelle Schafer is an ICF-certified coach and facilitator, specializing in career transition and leadership. She is the owner of Michelle Schafer Coaching, empowering people to achieve career fulfillment, and was recognized as one of Ottawa’s Top 20 career coaches in 2020. Schafer works with clients at all levels within government, tech, not-for-profit, health care and financial services and offers coaching 1:1, in groups and with teams. She is an executive contributor on career development topics with Brainz Magazine.

Embedding world of work knowledge in the classroom can transform how students feel about their learning

Lucy Sattler

Education has many purposes, and one of those is to help young people prepare for their working lives. School should give them the skills and knowledge they need to set off on a grand career adventure, and part of this includes the development of a positive career mindset. Young people need to switch on to their careers and build the skills and knowledge they’ll use to find, secure and keep work in a field they love throughout their lives.

Children begin to form ideas about the type of work they want to do when they’re very young – even before school has started – and these ideas coalesce into a mindset that guides their choices throughout school and beyond. This mindset helps them make decisions about which subjects they take, how hard they work and what other activities they choose, all of which will affect the number of options they have to choose from at the end of their time at school. That’s why it is so important to guide students as they build their career mindset.

Teachers often lack the time, training and knowledge to help students cultivate a career mindset. Research shows that subject-area teachers are a significant influence on post-school decisions, yet many teachers have little experience of other occupations outside of teaching, and limited exposure to apprenticeship pathways. This limits their ability to offer impartial career guidance on a wide range of pathways – they simply don’t have the knowledge they need, and this affects students’ development of career mindsets. If we want to ensure students leave school with a positive career mindset, then we need to start in the classroom.

Embedding world of work knowledge within the curriculum can transform how students feel about their learning. When teachers help students understand why they are learning algebra or Shakespeare, they become more engaged with the content, which in turn leads to improved academic and well-being outcomes. They can see the point, which gets them thinking about the purpose of what they’re doing and connects their classroom learning with life once school is over. From the earliest days of school, students can begin to connect their interests, knowledge and skills with possible future career paths; they learn to develop an individual career mindset.

 The role of mindset in engagement (and disengagement)

Disengagement is a problem across the board; according to Gallup’s latest State of the Global Workforce Report, four out of five adults don’t feel engaged at work. Disengaged individuals earn less, have poorer health outcomes and are less productive, which affects business and the economy. But disengagement isn’t confined to adults – a 2013 study of students in high-performing US high schools found that two-thirds of students are not regularly engaged in their learning.

These students don’t see the point of what they’re learning. The disengagement habits they form at school follow them into the workforce because they’re not acquiring the deep-learning, cognitive-engagement skills they need to build a productive career mindset.

Disengagement has three dimensions: behavioural, emotional and cognitive. While it is relatively easy to identify students who are behaviourally disengaged (attendance, in-class behaviour, etc.), it is much more difficult for educators to accurately identify students who are emotionally or cognitively disengaged. These students have an apathy toward school, which leads them to take the easy path; even gifted students settle for average marks and each day they simply “go through the motions.” This is a particular problem for students in their mid-teens, who are too far away from their final exams to find them motivating and are less likely to engage with standard school measures of achievement.

Expectancy-Value Theory links student beliefs about the value of their learning to their motivation and effort; students who see value in what they’re learning relative to their lives become more engaged. One solution to the disengagement problem could be to link what students are learning in class with their future careers and use this to build a positive career mindset.

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Fostering relevance in the classroom

Teachers who foster relevance between lesson content and the student’s interests and aspirations have the power to transform how students approach their learning.

To foster relevance, a teacher needs to understand how the content they deliver relates to jobs that exist in the labour market, and this requires a deep understanding of the world of work.

Teachers also need to connect the content in a way that helps students make decisions about how it relates to their lives. For example, a mathematics teacher may explain that engineers use trigonometry to build strong bridges, and that if a student becomes a builder, engineer or carpenter, they may also use trigonometry in this way. Teachers can go further and explain that students who find trigonometry interesting may want to explore careers where they get to work with spatial design at a range of levels, from product designers through to landscapers.

Students lack the world-of-work experience to be able to make these mental links without support, but the evidence base for fostering relevance as an intervention to improve student engagement is strong. With the right support, schools can implement programs to embed career learning with the curriculum.

An integrated approach

A school-wide approach is needed if students are to develop a positive career mindset during their time at school. Rather than sidelining career education to one class, or limiting exposure to specific year levels, a holistic and inclusive career education program creates a culture of career readiness and gives students the opportunity to learn about their career and reflect on a regular basis.

More schools are already moving towards this model; they are integrating innovation and entrepreneurship education, setting up ‘soft skill’ development programs, and offering peer mentoring to give students the non-academic skills they need to thrive. Collaborative programs, such as the University of Melbourne’s New Metrics for Success and the global Big Picture Learning movement, are seeking to engage with “forward-thinking” schools to revisit everything we value in education.

“… a holistic and inclusive career education program creates a culture of career readiness and gives students the opportunity to learn about their career and reflect on a regular basis.”

In some places, schools are now required to deliver career education to a set standard. For example, the UK introduced the Gatsby Benchmarks to mandate career education standards in schools. Shifting the school culture toward one that actively prepares students for their lives requires a change of focus and the introduction of career education into every aspect of school life.

Embedding career education content does not have to mean a complete rethink of our education system, as small steps can increase the number of touchpoints students have with career education on a regular basis. This may be as simple as introducing a ‘life prep’ section into the weekly assembly, and then reinforcing these skills in homeroom or student mentoring programs, which, over time, should lead to cultural change and a school-wide focus on life preparation and career management skills. Within the curriculum, inserting short videos and talking points that connect the current unit of work with particular jobs, or hanging posters that link learning areas with their associated careers, should help students assess the relevance of the content to their lives. Teachers should also be provided with the professional development and resources they need to connect their content with a range of career pathways at the start of each unit, with the support of the school career professional.

Through small actions, schools can begin to build a culture where a career mindset is valued.

Lucy Sattler is a career education professional with a passion for helping young people make informed choices about life once school is over. She is the CEO and Founder of Study Work Grow, and through her work she supports hundreds of schools and tens of thousands of students with engaging, evidence-based career development resources.

Curiosity and courage helped these practitioners overcome many obstacles to getting started in the field

Mai To and Vanessa Doan

Finding a job in a new field isn’t easy – and it’s that much more challenging when you’re a newcomer to the country as well. That was the situation we both found ourselves in after moving to Canada and trying to find work in the employment services field. Now that we have both found jobs that we love, we had a chance to reflect on our job searching journeys and were amazed by how applying a career mindset had helped us both thus far.

While we did not know each other before we lived in Canada, we have since found that we have many things in common: We are both Vietnamese and new immigrants to the country since 2019; we both have  backgrounds in marketing and communications; and most importantly, we are motivated to help people land their dream jobs. Recently, we shared our jobseeking journeys with each other – especially how we applied career mindsets to overcome obstacles arising from the intersectionality of having different marginalized identities: new immigrants, Asian, women, speaking English as a second language.

We hope that sharing our stories may inspire those with similar backgrounds facing the uncertainty of the jobseeking process, by showing how practising career mindsets can help us to not only to survive but to thrive in our chosen career path.

The foundation: the willingness to explore ourselves and seize opportunities

This career mindset kept us childlike and curious, by being open to exploring possible opportunities, but still adultlike, by seriously defining meaning in every exploration.

In our first couple of years in Canada, we embarked on exploration journeys to try different opportunities with our eyes wide open, so that we could learn more about ourselves as well as the job market in Canada.

Mai: When I was in the Master of Education program at Brock University, I was excited about the many opportunities available; it was like an all-you-can-eat buffet of experiences. I mixed and matched different activities, developing new identities as a community volunteer, a peer mentor, a researcher, a higher education marketing officer and an instructional support assistant.

I engaged in everything I could – like a child, not afraid of losing anything, including time. While opening up to new activities, I wrote reflections frequently to gradually define a career path for myself. Life is a total paradox; while I was not afraid of losing time, I ended up saving more of it in the long run by finding a career that rooted deeply in my heart and purpose.

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Vanessa: At this stage, similar to Mai, I had many career choices in my mind. Should I become an employment counsellor? An early childhood educator? Should I continue to work in marketing and communication? I fell deeper into what felt like a hole that I could not get out of, which was draining and terrifying. That was when a great career mindset came in: Follow the joy! I spent lot of time reflecting, and realized how engaged and energized I was when communicating and working with adults and youth.

I also did research on Career Cruising and held informational interviews with people in the fields I was considering. I gained insightful knowledge of the fields and learned that being an employment counsellor would be a perfect fit for me based on my skills, interests and experience.

The connection: The courage to identify our own career path

This career mindset kept us moving ahead with both direction and flexibility.

After two years in Canada, we had collected different experiences and skillsets that we could bring to the table. However, the only problem was that they were not connected.

Mai: It took courage for me to tell myself and the universe who I wanted to be professionally, because I was afraid that I would look stupid in the eyes of experts in the field and that I would never be enough to work in that profession. However, I knew that I had to be brave to choose a direction. Luckily, I had my compass, which was working in the education field.

I created my Plan A (full-time permanent positions in education, especially work-integrated learning related roles) and Plan B (any jobs in the education field). After two months with 20 applications – and partly thanks to receiving the Work-Integrated Learning Student of the Year 2019 award from EWO – I got one interview in a co-op office at an Ontario university. Unfortunately, I was not the selected candidate.

In the following 12 months, while applying actively to any positions I could in the education field, I ended up with several part-time, temporary jobs in my Plan B. During that time, I had tailored resumes and cover letters for approximately 100 full-time jobs, and got 10 interview opportunities, but was not successful. One day in July 2021 (exactly one year after graduation), thanks to connecting with my current supervisor through LinkedIn, I got my first full-time permanent job as a Career Services Specialist in Toronto.

Vanessa: The hardest part for me was that I was doubting myself. As a new immigrant with several barriers to employment, a student, a wife and mother of a 4-year-old boy, I was constantly juggling different roles. I got turned down in 20 interviews, and at some points, I wondered if I could ever land a job.

However, the moment I realized that I could turn my disadvantages into assets, I felt empowered and my confidence rose. “English is not my mother tongue” was replaced with “I am bilingual and my accent is a sign of bravery.” “I am an immigrant” was replaced with “As an immigrant, I can relate with other immigrants in many ways, as I have been through the same challenges in my job search.” It took courage and hard work for me to look at my self-perceived disadvantages in a different light when applying for employment counselling jobs.

To help bridge my knowledge gap, I took courses for career development practitioners. Then came an opportunity to gain a Community Support Worker diploma. I was hesitant, as it is not directly related to employment services. However, the career mindset of “I won’t always know where I’m going, but I can always know whether I’m going in the right direction” encouraged me to seize the opportunity. I learned about mental health challenges, interpersonal communication and other areas that are valuable for my current job.

Looking back, I realize that I grabbed all the chances with excitement because I knew that they aligned with my future destination of working in employment services. A key takeaway for me was that the job search journey is not like having a Google map that shows each direction from A to B; it is more about having a compass so that I know I am on the right track and keep moving forward.

The continuity: The desire to keep exploring and thriving

This career mindset keeps us continue learning and exploring, because change is inevitable.

We felt the transformation in us, as we adapted different career mindsets throughout the most difficult time of searching for our very first jobs in Canada. Now, we both have jobs, but we understand that the uncertainty will always be there, and the job market is forever changing and evolving. That is why we believe that applying career mindset should be continuous in every profession and at every career stage. In other words, we need to shake hands with “career mindset” and become lifelong friends if we want to have a meaningful career.

Mai To is currently working as a Career Services Specialist at Herzing College, Toronto campus. She has developed expertise in employer relations, post-secondary student career coaching, as well as internship advising and supervising. She is a lifelong learner and is working to get certified as a career development practitioner in the near future.

Vanessa Doan works as an Employment Counsellor at MOSAIC in Vancouver, BC. She holds a Master’s in Marketing Sales and Services from Paris-Sorbonne University, and a community support worker diploma. Doan’s interest in becoming an employment counsellor stemmed from her desire to help jobseekers move forward in their job search, bridging the gap between where they are and where they want to be in their career.

Asking kids what they want to be can contribute to a fixed mindset that is misaligned with the current economic landscape

Fanie Zis

“I don’t know what I want to be when I grow up. Still.”

This is what I heard from a distressed client who had two bachelor’s degrees, had just completed law school and had reported high levels of job dissatisfaction throughout her life, and now again in her new role as a lawyer in family law.

She was 43 years old.

Like many people, my client had been asked the question “What do you want to be when you grow up?” repeatedly in her childhood. Our interaction inspired me to explore this question, which is often asked at a very early age and throughout adolescent development. I wanted to better understand its effect on our mindsets – a mental attitude or state of mind, a set of beliefs, values and attitudes about oneself and the world.

This article will explore the potential problems associated with this question and accompanying mindset. It will also look at how you as a career professional can help clients discover and nurture a different mindset – one that aligns with the outer world of work, yet holds true to the client’s values, thus increasing their chances to have a healthy career development journey.

The question and the mindset

Although the “what do you want to be?” question has good intentions – such as promoting goal setting, career exploration and planning – it can also contribute to the following potential problems:

• Does not align with the realities of the current economic landscape and labour market
• Assumes the person’s skillset, interests, values and motivators will stay the same
• If the “career for life” or established vocational identity has not been set, then there is something wrong with them
• The occupation a client selects as a child may no longer exist when they are “grown up” will have changed substantially or it may not exist yet
• The concept of grown up is subjective, unclear and fixed. It assumes that grown up is a universal life stage where certain “markers” need to be met
• Puts too much emphasis on defining self as what you do, not other areas of self-identity
• Can contribute to mental health issues, low levels of job satisfaction, poor sense of well-being

However, the problem is not so much the question but the mindset the question cultivates. As soon as we start asking the question, we create a foundation for a mindset that does not offer a supportive framework for career development.

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Mindsets can be classified as “fixed” or “growth,” a concept developed by psychologist Carol Dweck. A fixed mindset is one that is rigid and believes that intelligence, learning, personality and ability are fixed, with no room for development. A growth mindset is one where these factors can grow with time and experience. The concept of “not yet” is also introduced in Dweck’s theory. So, in response to someone asking, “What do you want to be when you grow up?”, a growth mindset may respond, “I don’t know. Not yet.”

This question can contribute to a fixed, outdated mindset, which is not in line with the current growth-based economic landscape. There is thus a mismatch in mindsets. To better illustrate this, here is what this might look like if these mindsets could talk:

Fixed mindset

• “I have to figure out what I am going to be when I grow up.”
• “I am not considered grown up until I find a career and stick with it.”
• “The career I choose in high school must and will be the one I have for the rest of my working life.”
• “If I don’t like my career when I am grown up, there is something wrong with me”
• “Grown up is a destination.”

Growth mindset

• “What I want to be now may change later on and that’s okay.”
• “What I choose now may cease to exist in the future.”
• “I am in control of my career development.”
• “I will need to continuously learn new skills even though my job title may stay the same.”
• “Grown up is not a destination, it’s about the ongoing process of growing.”

At the same time, the economic landscape and labour market would be saying things like, “I’m here today, gone tomorrow”; “Provide your own job security”; and “Ongoing learning and development are a necessity.”

The growth mindset responds to that reality, whereas the fixed mindset might be unprepared for changes in the economic landscape.

3 ways to help clients cultivate a career mindset shift

Your client cannot control the world around them, but they can choose their mindset. These strategies can help clients move past the binary thinking of the “what do you want to be when you grow up?” question and toward a more fulfilling exploration of career.

1. Evoke awareness: Help your client understand their own mindset. What are some of their values, beliefs and attitudes about career development? How is their mindset shaped by societal, cultural and familial influences? How is this mindset helping them/not helping them?
2. Challenge their current mindset: To change a mindset, you need to challenge it. Strategies could include:

a. Learning about career development theories, such as Dr. Jim Bright’s Chaos Theory and John Krumboltz’s’ Planned Happenstance, to introduce the client to new ideas.

b. Connecting with others to learn about their career pathways through informational interviews. What are some of the client’s findings? What can the client learn and draw from this experience?

c. Changing the question. Instead of “what do you want to be when you grow up?” try:

• In what ways would you like to grow?
• If you could create any job you wanted, what would this look like?
• What roles would you like to take on?
• Who do you want to be?
• After you’ve reached “grown up,” what will you have accomplished and where will you be?

3. Help them get out of their comfort zone

Having a particular mindset, especially one that is fixed, can feel comfortable, even if it is not the most effective mindset for a particular situation. You can help your client step out of their comfortable, fixed mindset by encouraging them to embrace fear, facilitate learning and thus enter a growth zone, which could lead to a new mindset. What is comfortable/uncomfortable is subjective and can include anything the client is willing to do that helps them face their fear and discover new territory. Suggested strategies will vary but some ideas may include: trying something new (task, course, hobby), implementing one change in their daily routine, identifying a fear and taking one step toward facing it.

 These strategies offer a starting point for career professionals to help clients let go of current attitudes and beliefs that are not serving them. We can support them to explore what it is like to live life through a different mindset – one that involves accepting a constant state of learning, understanding and living out their values.

And please, let’s help prepare the next generation for a successful career and do away with asking “What do you want to be when you grow up?” Growth never stops, and by cultivating a mindset that accepts constant change, we can learn to sit in the unknown and to keep exploring.

Coming from a background in psychology, counselling and career development, Fanie Zis is a Professional Certified Coach with the International Coaching Federation (ICF). Zis works as a Life Smart Coach for Homewood Health’s EFAP program and as a freelance life and career coach, working with clients by supporting them through personal and professional development and life enhancement processes.