Remember why you started
Your career isn’t just a series of jobs; it’s a reflection of your values, your passions and the person you aspire to be. Aligning your career development to your core values is a key component of creating a meaningful working life. It isn’t just a formula for success – it’s the foundation of a purposeful life, as Careers & Employability Manager Katrina Gardner tells Avenue.
The good news is that year-on-year, when we ask the question in our Graduate Outcomes survey, the vast majority of respondents agree that their post-UofG career path is meaningful. We would like to see this rise close to 100% as we strongly believe that our students and graduates deserve to find their career meaningful, not just soon after graduation but for the duration of their working lives.
We believe that all of our graduates can achieve both personal fulfilment and professional success. We build career readiness in students by offering them opportunities right from the start of their university life, to reflect on and build self-awareness of their skills, strengths, life goals, passions and values. By placing significance on these, we encourage students to factor in all components when assessing the suitability of career paths. You, of course, have already moved on from university, but I'm sure will recognise the importance of considering your personal values when navigating your long-term career in the ever-evolving job market of Industry 4.0 and beyond.
A profession with purpose
For careers practitioners, the basis of a realistic and well-informed career decision is to match our self-awareness with our opportunity-awareness. Self-awareness comprises what we want, including values, and what we have to offer, such as strengths. A tool you can use to ensure you cover all aspects (and match to opportunity awareness) is the Venn Diagram of Purpose (below), created by Andres Zuzunaga. This has links with the ancient Japanese concept of ikigai which can be translated as 'a reason to get up in the morning’ or 'waking up to joy'. It has become popular in helping many maintain a sense of purpose in life. So, if we match what we love with what the world needs, then we can achieve our mission and find a path that matches our values. Combine this with what you are good at and what you will be paid for and we can ensure that our passion, vocation and profession are also factored in, thus all combining into a sense of purpose.
Conscious journeys
Gone are the days when a single job defined a lifetime. Not so long ago, it was commonplace for recent graduates to focus on reaching one career destination – a job role, an organisation – where they could remain for many years. But times have changed – your career path can now take you on many purposeful journeys throughout life. Start by prioritising your current values, strengths, and passions and let the career fit alongside, finding roles and organisations that match your passion, your core values and your sense of purpose.
This article was first published in January 2025.
Aine O’Brien (PhD 2022) is a shining example of an alum on a mission to immerse her own personal ethical principles in her career.
Image: courtesy Aine O'Brien
“I think the big turning point for me was when COP26 came to Glasgow, right there in the West End. I went to some of the events and I can remember the exact moment I thought, 'Right – this is what I want to do.' I was about a year away from finishing my PhD, but I felt like climate was where I wanted to steer my skills.
After graduation, I did a post-doc at SUERC (Scottish Universities’ Environmental Research Centre), modelling wildfire scenarios under future climate change – different global temperature increases and how these would affect the severity of wildfires. It was really cool to be able to use techniques from my PhD in Earth & Planetary Science for something important and tangible.
I’m always looking for something where I can use my science skills to try and help people and planet, whether that’s science communication, policy, data analysis – because I just love graphs! – I really see that as my guiding principle.
My most recent role really made me feel like I was contributing to meaningful climate action. I was doing a kind of detective work, figuring out which carbon offsets were actually making a difference; if you bought a carbon credit, was it planting a tree? Was it renewable energy? What was it doing? It felt awesome – so good to be a part of. When I look back later in my career, I just hope to have had some sort of meaningful impact on people and the planet, however small that might be."
Access to our Careers, Employability & Opportunity service is just one of the many alumni benefits you can enjoy after graduation. Here is the full range of services, benefits and offers available.