Define your interests

Finding the perfect career is difficult for most. We'd love to follow our heart and be what we wanted as a kid. Astronaut? Sure thing. But how do you merge your interests with your skills and pick the career that's just right? You find out what you're particularly good at. Basically, build on your strengths.

The goal is to be the best in your field. The only way to do that is to take your strengths and keep building them till there is no equal. If you can draw, expand laterally. Learn digital techniques for drawing. Try styles that are not your comfort zone. Being bad at something also shows you what you should avoid. Because a bad skill can be improved but only just so in most cases. In terms of job happiness, being bad at something is really demoralizing. But you don't count it out unless you've tried everything.

Let's start with interests. These can be functional (e.g., how do we improve the social marketing of our product?) or pertain to a particular industry such as leather or automotive accessories. A combination will bring about the best choices. So, how do you figure out what you're good at and what you're interested in, and then translate that information into a functional area and industry?

1. Try it out

If you like something, read up on it. Google it. Talk to the people in this field and see if they have insights that will either get you more involved or show you this is not what you wanted. See if you can do an internship or be an apprentice/volunteer.  To make best use of your time, do small experiments. If you think you'd be good at interior design, try painting a wall properly. Study colours. Maybe even try building a scale model. Build a social networking page and use the colours to your benefit.

But if you do try something in the view of turning it into a career, plan to do it big. Have it in manageable chunks, but the end goal should be big. It's easy to 'try out' some Facebook page management but to make it into a marketing career, you need to plan on a product/service that needs to be promoted, It should include a plan of how far you can take it. 

2. Talk to people

Find out from people who tried or are in the field. Learn what they do, how they do it, where they work, what's it like. It's also networking. People love to discuss their achievements so ask away. You're good at writing and want to know what a copywriter does? It's not just writing a few words. Expand the range of people you ask to get a more balanced idea of where the field/industry is and how it operates. People in banking can have different viewpoints depending on whether they are form the private or public sector. Send people a survey if you think they would feel more comfortable being anonymous.

3. Dig deeper into your interests

Find out the underlying aspects of your interest. You like to paint but you're not considering yourself as the next Picasso. What does painting do for you? Does it mean you're better with shapes and spatial activities? Perhaps you can go into interior design where colors and space utilization play a big part. Perhaps you like online gaming but don't want to take it up as a career in itself. Maybe it's the teamwork or coordination aspect that is interesting. These are the things that drive your interest. Try this out for all things you are interested in, find the underlying drivers.

Once you do that, you can identify specific companies offering you a task that fits in with your interests drivers. And then, things may just change. It all adds up to experience and helps to refine your career interests. Picking a field that makes you want to go to work is something that will help you grow and excel.