This post is written by Sonia Bhattacharyya
Have you seen career news lately? Thousands of seats in engineering colleges have no takers! Surely, the number of students have not declined? Where are these students going? Which career paths are they taking?
A friend of mine studied to be an engineer – an architect, to be more precise. Today, he’s a “landscape designer” – a job role that did not exist when he chose to become an architect. As for me, I never became an engineer; yet, I am in an enviable profession – instructional design.
Not all new age professions are about design though. Let’s take a look at some cool new professions:
- Technology Evangelist: This profession requires you to be so passionate about a particular technology, that you can persuade other people into adopting it. It does sound a bit like marketing, but it’s not wholly that. You may be required to secure a buy-in from your own company’s management or staff – in this it’s a bit like change management. You may also be required to train people or just disseminate information. Your tools in this trade will be mainly the social media and your own communication skills.
- Adventure Consultant: You may be hired by an adventure club, an activity resort, a travel company or even an event management company. What would you be doing? – providing exciting adventures to your clients. The adventures could range from trekking, rock climbing, to kayaking, white water rafting, paragliding, bungee jumping, and so on. You needn’t be an expert at any of these, but you would need to coordinate between the expert guides and your clients and ensure fun as well as safety and security of all.
- Kids Club Host: It is apparent from the title that this involves playing with kids. But that’s not all – you have to be trained in first aid and kindergarten teaching. You have to spend hours with children, sometimes travel with them, while ensuring they have fun and stay safe.
- Curator: “Aha!” you might say, “caught you! Curators have been around for ages, looking after our museums.” But the curators I am talking about are music curators, data curators, content curators, and fashion curators. Depending on your interest, you could be any one of these. Essentially you would do a lot research on a particular topic and gather a lot of information to be consumed by your customers.
- Social Media Strategist: No business can afford to ignore the social media any more. In fact, there is a mad race to be on top of the social media. If you are one of those who understand the dynamics of how things work in the digital social media, you would be perfect for this job. You would decide what to post, where, and when – the precise time, day of the week, and month, to get the maximum eyeballs. You would be a content strategist, marketing strategist, business strategist, and brand strategist – all rolled into one.
- Career Development Facilitators: With so many varied professions around, one could be confused about which path to pursue and which career to opt for. As a career development facilitator, you could help individuals decide which career is the most suitable for their particular talents. You would start with a simple psychometric test to determine the person’s abilities and interests and then draw up the perfect, fail-safe option through an interview with the person.
- Identity and Access Manager: With data security becoming increasingly important for all businesses, all companies need a person for security, maintenance and access Administration of information and data. To be in this role, you would have a comprehensive understanding of multiple operational and security technologies
- Growth Hacker: This job role isavailable in start-up companies. As a growth hacker, you will aggressively promote the company’s business in every possible way.
- Food taster: There are wine tasters and tea tasters – now there are food tasters. I wish I could say this job is for anyone who loves to eat. But no! This job is for the discerning eater – you have to know your spices and flavours. You have to taste food not only from your company’s kitchens, but also from kitchens of competitors and advice the chefs. If you become really good at this, you may be called upon to judge culinary competitions.
- Resource Allocation Planner: In companies that employ thousands of people with a wide variety of skills, working on hundreds of projects, the people and other resources need to be moved around and distributed. In this role, you will need to have a clear picture of the company’s resources and new and expiring business projects. This is a combination of human resource management and general administration.
This is, by no means, a comprehensive list of new professions. More are emerging every day. These are exciting times. So, keep an eye on the recruitment pages.
