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Asked by abbie b to Holly, graemesutcliffe, Fran, dominicwilliams, Chris on 5 Jul 2024. This question was also asked by away1omen.
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Holly Duns answered on 5 Jul 2024:
I never really decided, it just kind of happened and I went with the flow.
When I was at school I always thought I wanted to be a vet, but didn’t do well enough sciences so knew that wasn’t going to be an option. I had a look at other options that aligned with my way of thinking and migrated towards policing with the view of joining the mounted or dog division. I knew I didn’t want to just join the police so did an undergraduate degree in criminology to provide more of a stepping stone into a specialist division.
After I finished uni I just wasn’t sure what direction I wanted to go in so I travelled a bit and when I came back, after maturing and having a bit more life experience I wanted to learn something new and started looking at forensics, with the view it would still align to policing. Due to not being great at biology I knew traditional forensics would be really though to get into so i came across digital forensics and cyber and the masters degree at Cranfield.
Personally, I think its important, if you are not sure what you want to do, to keep an open mind, develop transferrable skills and be adaptable. There is so much you can do in the tech space so you can make it fit your aspirations and you move forward.
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Fran Biggin answered on 16 Jul 2024:
I decided on the career I’m in now when I left the Army. The specific job I’m in grew out of the qualifications I took and the people I met while doing them.
I’ve found that often a job finds you – an opportunity comes up that looks interesting and you take it. I’ve met very few people who have decided in advance what job they want and then gone out and got it
Comments
ruthiep commented on :
I don’t think I’ve decided, my whole career seems to have just happened to me. Don’t get me wrong, I find it interesting. If I was studying now though, I would probably be in a different field. I just went with the things I thought sounded interesting, regardless of job prospects. At the end of the day, it helps if you enjoy your job!
Andrew M commented on :
In the general sense of being a chemist, some time in my first year at university. I was very torn between physics and chemistry, even after I’d signed up study chemistry. It was only after I started the course that I settled into this path, helped by the realisation that I’d started to loose sight of the mathematics I thought I’d need for physics – those equations stopped creating images and started to become just ink on a page.
The fine detail of this career happened partly because my company offered me a job but mostly because one of my early managers realised they’d offered me the wrong job and rescued me from the misery of what I was doing at the time. I didn’t expect to last one year, but thanks to her intervention I’ve been here 20. Some things you can plan for, some things you can work towards, but there’s always going to be an element of good fortune and hoping you encounter good people.