Getting prepared for your future career

By Yidan Ren

It’s never too early to start preparing for your future career, and college is here to guide you through all the steps. The list below is a few things you should check out in order to be prepared for the real world by the time you graduate.

Join a student organization

You have probably heard this bit of wisdom from every college advice piece ever, but it just shows how important joining an organization is, especially if you join one related to your major. While students are able to learn the required technical skills within the classroom, this environment might not teach you the social skills needed in society, especially how to connect with professionals or what to do in an interview. This is why joining an organization related to what you study is so important.

Another great benefit that some organizations offer are talks from company leaders as speakers for professional events. This is a great opportunity for you to learn more about a company’s culture as well as mingle among the recruiters to gain connections.

Internships and career fairs

It’s never too early to start hunting for internships and attend career fairs, so don’t be scared to prepare for them even as a new student. If you show your passion and dedication as a young student, it will appeal to the recruiters as someone who is goaloriented, and they could keep an eye out for you when it comes your time to apply for internships or full-time offers.

Build your network

Throughout your college career, utilize all the resources that are available to you in order to succeed. Reach out to your alumni from your organizations, the teacher’s assistant from your classes as well as your professors. Networking is a great way for you to gain insight from someone who has already walked through your experience; people can really give you advice that resonates with you. One way of networking is utilizing LinkedIn to connect with recruiters after each professional event or career fair, which can help build your online presence. When you meet with recruiters, make sure you wear business casual attire and have your resume ready. Mentors from your student organization can help prepare you by offering tips for your resume and hosting mock interviews.

University Career Services (UCS) is also a helpful resource, and they offer workshops in resume writing, mock interviews, salary negotiation, and financial literacy. Work interest, personality and strengths assessments are also available at UCS to assist with the career exploration process.

On the Cougar Pathway platform available in your AccessUH account, students have access to apply for on-campus job opportunities. Students can apply for internships via Cougar Pathway as well.

According to Cynthia Olmedo of UCS, employers prefer to hire sophomore and juniors, opposed to seniors that are near graduation. Olmedo also offers this personal tip for freshmen, “You don’t have to know exactly where you are headed, but you do have to know who you are in order to get where you are meant to be.”

Explore your options

The chances of you knowing exactly what you want to pursue and major in are extremely small, which means that college is the place for you to explore your options and experience as much as you can. If there’s one thing that I truly resonate with, it’s that college is a place where you are under a protective umbrella, because you can try as much as you want without suffering from many consequences. I’ve found this to be true, and you won’t have this much freedom once you have a real job and adult responsibilities. You have to use this to explore things because that’s the only way for you to know what you want in the future.