Once you make a decision, identify your long- and short-term goals . This helps to chart a course toward eventually landing work in your chosen field.

• Long-term goals typically take about three to five years to reach, while you can usually fulfill a short-term goal in six months t...

Before you can choose the right career, you must learn about yourself.

• Your values, interests, soft skills, and aptitudes, in combination with your personality type
• Make some occupations a good fit for you and others completely inappropriate.

Put together a career action plan, a written document that lays out all the steps you will have to take to reach your goals. Think of it as a road map that will take you from point A to B, then to C and D.

Write down all your short- and long-term goals and the steps you wi...

When you have only a few occupations left on your list, start doing more in-depth research. Arrange to meet with people who work in the occupations in which you are interested. They can provide firsthand knowledge about the careers on your short list. 

Access your netwo...

At this point, you'll be thrilled you managed to narrow your list down to only 10 to 20 options. Now you can get some basic information about each of the occupations on your list. 

• Find job descriptions and educational, training, and licensing requirements in published...

Based on what you learned from your research so far, begin eliminating the careers you don't want to pursue any further. You should end up with two to five occupations on your "short list."

• If your reasons for finding a career unacceptable are non-negotiable, cross it ...