Once you graduate, the world’s your oyster but figuring out what to do next can be a daunting task.
After spending four or five years studying; adjusting to life after university can be tough. Your graduation ceremony signifies the end of an era and the start of something new but you may be left wondering, ‘what next?’
There are a number of different routes to take as you contemplate what to do after university – and everyone’s journey will be different. You can search for a graduate job, enroll on a postgraduate course, set up your own business, volunteer or travel the world. The two major routes that I observed that the Nigeria graduate opts for: is either to work or further study.
There are so many people who have graduated (or will be graduating) and still have no idea what they want to do with their life. And you know what? That’s ok! Most people don’t.
Now let me show you what you must do next after graduating.
Four Things to Do Next After Graduating:
Understand the Power of Time in Your Hand:
The greatest resource available to you as a graduate is time. Time is your number one asset and now is when you have the most flexibility to use it. It surprises me to see most of our graduates wasting this precious resource available to them; all in the name of waiting for government employment, oil and gas opportunities or telecommunication offers e.t.c.
After graduating every graduate should realize that they are entering the greatest five-year window of their life. There are two things they should keep in mind. The first is to acknowledge that they are entering some of the greatest years of their life. The second is that this is the moment when they should take some risks; try to achieve whatever they always dream about.
This is not the time to get the job your parents always wanted you to get. This is not the time to try to equate yourself with your friends, buying stuffs like smarts phones, cars and renting very luxurious apartment. This is the time, however, to realise that you have a five-year window (three for some, eight for others) for you to attack the life that you want to win
These will be the best and easiest years of your life because it’s your chance to do what you love and try out what you want to do. Why? Because you don’t have all the baggage.
Most of you don’t have children yet. Most of you are not married. So, this is the time before the world has sucked out all your hopes and dreams. You still have this window—the next five years to help you achieve your goals.
Discover Yourself:
One of the most important things to do after graduating is to discover yourself; know your talents, your potential, know the reason why you were created.
According to the dictionary, a talent is a natural endowment of a person. It is an ability or natural capacity that we have, which may range from our creativity to our athletic abilities. We all have them, but we are not always so good at identifying what they are.
If you can determine what your talents are, you can tap into an amazing resource that can help you in every aspect of your life, including your business.
I have heard all kind of stuffs from graduates; things like if I get a postgraduate degree it will better my chances of getting employed, or if I can craft out a perfect CV then companies would noted it. All of them are good but they are not the most important thing you need to do to succeed after graduating.
Taking responsibility for your career starts with an accurate assessment of your current skills and performance. You can discover yourself by doing the following: pay attention to what other people are saying about your abilities and things that you are good at, also pay careful attention to things that you find very easy to accomplish. Finally seek for good coaching; if you can’t find one around you, our details are below for you to contact us for it.
Apply Yourself to Training/Development and Mentoring:
We are all born with the propensity to achieve, succeed, and thrive in our endeavours. We have certain skills, talents and abilities that can be nurtured, shaped, formed, and encouraged. The human species has a vast number of these talents, skills and abilities, and it remains a wonder as to how some individuals reach the pinnacle of perfection with their skills and talents, and why others remain simply mediocre.
You need to develop your talent, work on and profit from it. This is the most important part of knowing what to do next after graduation, you need to learn how to refine the ability, make it marketable, invest in training, self development. Get mentors and coaches, you need to attend seminars, workshop, conferences, read books.
The fastest way to develop your skill is to get a mentor, someone who is already successful in the area you are looking at.
Being Known for Something:
After discovering your talent and developing it; you need to look for a niche and specialised in it until you are known as an expert in the area.
Being seen as an authority in your field is pretty much your ticket to building a successful business. Instead of trying to please everyone, focus your efforts on a small amount of possible clients. This approach will help understand the niche better.
One of the fastest ways to increase business and attract attention is to become a go-to authority in your field. When potential clients seek the help or products you provide and your name pops up, you’re bound to reap the benefits of the exposure.
An expert is recognized as an authority who knows in-depth knowledge about a specific subject. Such individuals solve problems, and when they offer invaluable solutions to make pain go away, people pay well for their advice, wisdom and expertise.
NOTE
Due to the numbers of calls and emails we have been receiving as feedback from our trainings and articles, our team has decided to focus more on the youths and fresh graduates capacity development in our subsequent articles. We will be helping them discover themselves.
– Olodu keonyedi is a trained engineer and by passion and personal development a public/motivational speaker, a business coach and human capacity developer, he has a B.Eng degree in Civil Engineering from the University of Nigeria Nsukka, he is a member of Nigeria Society of Engineer and a COREN registered Engineer
Email: olodukeonyedi@gmail.com Tel: 08037489704, www.instagram.com/sir_keon. www.facebook.com/olodu keonyedi_mentorship
