How to Find a Truly Fulfilling Career
It’s the start of a brand new year, and for many of us, that means reflecting on the previous one. A lot of us will be making resolutions to change the things about our lives that we aren’t happy with, and for a lot of us, the thing making us unhappy is the thing we spend most of our time doing – working. The decision to change career isn’t an easy one. After all, after you spend all of that time and effort retraining, who is to say that your new job won’t be just as unsatisfying as your old one?
That’s why if you are planning on changing your career, it’s essential that you think about what really matters to you personally. Finding your dream job isn’t all about money; there are a huge number of factors that make the answer to the question ‘what is your dream job’ completely different for every single one of us. This is good news; you wouldn’t want to be competing with the entire world for the same job, would you?
How do you know what your dream job is?
The charitable organization 80,000 hours have set out to answer this question as part of their career guide. Eighty thousand hours are dedicated to helping people find meaningful work that is fulfilling to them and has a positive impact on the world.
According to 80,000 hours, finding your dream job isn’t quite as simple as just following your passion. Some passions are great as hobbies, but as careers are less suitable. They recommend building your career around something that aligns with your skillset and that you could become passionate about. They advise looking for:
- Work you are good at
- Work that helps other people
- Work that has supportive conditions. For example, you should feel engaged and interested in the work you are doing, feel supported by your colleagues, and that lacks negatives such as unfair pay or unsafe working conditions.
It’s important to look for work you are mostly good at or at least have the capacity to become good at. If you are working in a field where your skill sets don’t allow you to thrive, then you will start to feel disheartened, and you won’t feel satisfied with what you are doing. That’s not to say that you have to be brilliant at the job straight away, that’s unrealistic and anyway, there are a lot of benefits to learning new things. However, it is important that your job is a positive challenge that you can overcome, as opposed to a negative slog that makes you miserable.
Human beings are social creatures; we are at our best when we are working as part of a community or group. The feeling that we are helping other people is essential to our happiness, which is why finding a job that allows you to help other people is important for your career satisfaction. This doesn’t mean that you necessarily have to work in healthcare or the charity sector, but it does mean that you need to ensure that your chosen career allows you to feel as though you are doing something to help other people, even if it’s in a small way.
A high salary isn’t one of the factors 80,000 hours highlights. A recent article by CNBC explored how much money it takes to be happy and found that while it’s important to earn enough money to feel comfortable, happiness doesn’t increase exponentially the more money you earn. According to CNBC, individuals earning $95,000 experience the highest levels of overall life satisfaction, whereas individuals earning between $60,000 and $75,000 had the best levels of emotional well being. Once you start getting above that level, happiness levels don’t go up any further.
Finally, it’s important to consider things like how many hours you want to spend at work, and when you prefer working. Some people have hobbies that they are very passionate about, and would therefore like to spend less time at work so that they can focus on them. In the same way, for a lot of people, time with their family is much more valuable than time climbing the corporate ladder. These are important factors to consider when you are thinking about what your dream job might be.
Top 10 Best Careers
So bearing all of that in mind, what might be a fulfilling career for you? There are thousands of possible options available, and it can be difficult to know where to start looking!
US News recently compiled a list of the top 100 best jobs based on salary, levels of employment, predicted growth, stress level, and work-life balance. At the top of this list were the following ten professions:
- Software developer
- Dentist
- Physician assistant
- Orthodontist
- Nurse practitioner
- Statistician
- Physician
- Speech-language pathologist
- Oral and maxillofacial surgeon
- Veterinarian
To help you to decide whether any of these careers might be the one for you, let’s look a little deeper.
Software Developer
Median Salary: $103,620
Software developers are the people who make computers do the things that we need them to do. They write the code that runs websites, apps, and the programs on your computer that you use every day. They are the people behind the AI that runs self-driving cars. The uses for a talented software developer are pretty much limitless!
If you are a person who has a logical mindset and enjoys problem-solving that it could be a career that’s very satisfying to you. Another great thing about it is that you can do it from anywhere. Depending on the culture of the company you’re working for, provided you’re meeting your deadlines working hours and location can be very flexible.
Dentist
Median Salary: $151,850
The word dentist is familiar to most of us and conjures up the image of someone in a white coat standing over their patient and performing dental check-ups or tooth extractions.
What you may not know is that there are lots of other ways to be a dentist. Dentists also work in academic research, in hospital settings alongside physicians, for international agencies, and some even work in third world countries providing care to people who might not be able to access it otherwise.
Dentistry is a great option for someone who wants to be able to contribute to the health of the population while at the same time keeping reasonably regular hours and earning a good salary.
Physician Assistant
Median Salary: $108,610
A physician assistant works under the supervision of a physician to provide care to patients. The scope of their work will vary widely depending on the state legislation that they are governed by and how the physician they are working with operates. They can choose to specialize in a particular branch of medicine (like pediatrics or oncology, for example), which will also determine the type of work they do.
Generally, physician assistants can:
- Order and analyze tests
- Counsel patients on preventative care and take their medical history
- Carry out physical examinations
- Write prescriptions
- Assist in surgeries
As with a lot of medical jobs, the hours can be irregular, but the role is a great opportunity to help your community.
Orthodontist
Median Salary: $208,000
An orthodontist’s focus is ensuring that their patients have a ‘healthy bite,’ that is, that their teeth are in proper alignment and that they are not overcrowded.
Although we might think of braces as something that’s only worn by teenagers, in reality, people of all ages visit the orthodontist. Not only is their work important for ensuring that people can eat and function comfortably, but it can really impact the lives of their patients because it allows them to smile without feeling self-conscious!
Orthodontics is a great career choice for those of you who enjoy working with others, would like to keep reasonably regular hours, and would feel satisfied by helping others to find their smile.
Nurse Practitioner
Median Salary: $107,030
Nurse Practitioners are becoming more and more important within the medical field. They are Registered Nurses who have undergone additional graduate-level training to allow them to work with their patients autonomously, in some states without the supervision of a physician.
Nurse Practitioners generally work in a hospital setting, but they can also set up their own clinics. If they choose to get their DNP (Doctor of Nursing Practice), then they can even work at a management level at the hospital or in research at an academic institution.
Nurse Practitioners work closely with their patients, and like the physician’s assistant, can specialize in any number of areas of medicine.
Statistician
Median Salary: $87,780
If you are an intelligent person who loves to solve problems using methodical processes, then a career as a statistician would suit you.
The role of a statistician is to utilize both mathematics and computer programs in order to gather large amounts of data and then analyze it and draw conclusions. This work is vital for predicting trends, which is important both in business and in government.
A lot of statisticians work for the federal government, and others work for businesses. The role is usually office-based, and you would work reasonably regular hours – depending on the culture of the company or agency that you are working for.
Physician
Median Salary: $194,500
Physicians are most often found working in a hospital or another health care facility, but they can also work in government institutions or for private businesses.
The salary and rewards for becoming a physician are high, but the amount of education needed to reach that level can make it prohibitive for some people. The amount of physicians employed over the next ten years is expected to grow by around 4%, which isn’t that high and could mean that gaining employment becomes quite competitive. Other jobs in the medical field, such as Nurse Practitioner or Physician’s Assistant, have a much higher predicted rate of growth.
Speech-Language Pathologist
Median Salary: $77,510
A speech-language pathologist‘s role is to diagnose and treat speech and language disorders in adults and children, which might include stammering or struggling to understand others or express themselves effectively. They can also treat swallowing disorders, which may result from things like stroke, and work to provide aural rehabilitation for people who are deaf or hard of hearing.
They might work in a hospital setting, but some work in research or even in corporate settings. It is a career path that has the opportunity to be hugely diverse and also immensely satisfying as you enable people to communicate more effectively with the world around them.
Oral and Maxillofacial Surgeon
Median Salary: $208,000
Oral and Maxillofacial surgeons must have expertise in both the medical and the dental fields. They work to diagnose and treat the incredibly broad range of conditions that can affect the facial area, including the jaw and mouth.
They might carry out surgery to resolve dental issues like impacted teeth or dental implants, but they also use their expertise to treat facial trauma and oral cancers.
Oral and Maxillofacial surgeons must have a medical degree, complete basic surgery training, and then move on to a specialist Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery training center to become qualified. They will often work in collaboration with other medical professionals such as surgeons and dentists.
Veterinarian
Median Salary: $95,500
This was everyone’s dream career as a kid, right? If you’re an animal lover, then this could be a great choice for you.
The population of people aged between 34 and 59 is growing, and as this group is historically most likely to be pet owners, this means an increase in pets and an increase in clients for a skilled veterinarian. There is also demand for veterinarians to look after livestock and to become involved in work around ensuring the sustainability of breeding animals for agriculture.
There will likely be some odd hours for a veterinarian; however, this is dependent on the type of work you do and which organization you choose to work for.
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