The Career Planning Process: Exploration
Opening Doors to Career Possibilities
As a graduate student, you’re often deep in research, juggling academic deadlines, and managing competing responsibilities. Amid all this, one looming question can feel both urgent and overwhelming: What do I want to do after I graduate? Whether you’re pursuing a master’s degree or a PhD, the first step in the career planning process will set you up for success. Exploration can provide clarity and direction, and it is a phase where you will orient yourself towards an open career mindset.
What Is Career Exploration?
Career exploration is the process of gathering information about what’s out there: resources, opportunities, and more. In this stage, you are preemptively thinking about yourself and the professional landscape in order to prime yourself for an extensive job search ahead. It’s about curiosity, not commitment and you shouldn’t put pressure on yourself to know everything or have a clear idea just yet. Think of it as an invitation to learn more about the world of work and how your unique skills, values, and interests might align with different roles, industries, or sectors.
Exploration is not about making final decisions—it’s about expanding your knowledge of what’s out there. This stage can be energizing and even fun, especially when you approach it with an open mind.
Why Exploration Matters
Many graduate students default to a familiar career path without fully considering the range of careers where their talents and degrees are valued. Exploration allows you to:
- Discover career paths you may never have considered
- Understand the day-to-day realities of different roles
- Learn the language and skills of various sectors
- Connect with people doing work that interests you
Exploration helps reduce anxiety by transforming the unknown into the knowable.
Where to Start
1. The Graduate Career Center’s Digital Tools
Our website was carefully curated for the student experience and includes a wide range of resources for every stage of the career planning process. In this early stage of your journey, dedicate some time to review our Career Tools page and familiarize yourself with what we have to offer.
These tools aren’t meant to give you a definitive answer but can spark ideas, generate familiarity, and prepare you for the upcoming, more detailed stages of the process.
2. Browse Other Online Career Resources
Resources like the Occupational Outlook Handbook can help you map skills to careers and describe common tasks, job outlooks, and salary ranges. These broad career sites are a good starting point for anyone who’s still in the early stages and wants to learn more about different fields.
3. Talk to People
One of the most powerful tools in career exploration is the informational interview. Graduate alumni, faculty, or professionals in fields of interest can offer insight into their career paths and help you better understand specific roles. Try asking:
- What’s a typical day like?
- How did you end up in this career?
- What do you enjoy most about your job?
- What other occupations did you consider?
4. Attend Events and Workshops
Career centers host industry panels, employer site visits, and networking events that allow you to interact with professionals across fields. These experiences can open up entirely new possibilities.
5. Review Job Postings
Look at current job listings, even if you’re not applying yet. Pay attention to:
- Skills and qualifications required
- Keywords used in job descriptions
- Patterns across roles that interest you
Take note of what makes the most sense to you, your interests, skills, and values.
Make Exploration Manageable
You don’t need to explore every possible career. Start with a few paths that pique your interest, and go deeper. Set small goals, like doing one informational interview per week or reading about a new industry each month.
Keep Track of Your Insights
Take notes on what you come across in your early exploration phase. It may be useful to start an organized spreadsheet or journal of the following components:
- Career titles and fields that interest you
- People you talk to and what you learn
- Skills you want to develop
- Questions that come up along the way
This record will become a valuable tool as you move to the more detailed steps: Reflection and Research.
Final Thoughts
Exploration is the gateway to the rest of your career planning journey. By approaching it with openness and curiosity, you give yourself the gift of choice—and the confidence to move forward with purpose.
Stay tuned for the next post in our Career Planning Process series: Reflection—where you’ll begin to connect the dots between what you’ve learned and who you are.
Written By: Julie Nguyen, Assistant Director of Career Management, Graduate Career Center