I have been thinking about people's talents and their study choices.
If you are talented in some area, and you enjoy it, should you seek to advance this or study other areas which are more "in favor" with industry at the time?
As a faculty of ICT we have been blessed with many students lately. Most of these had little talent or interest in ICT. (I'm sure that they all have talents, just not in ICT) These students obviously thought that it was better to study something that is in favor than to study what they are good at and interest in...
In my opinion I would always choose to build upon my talents than to go with current trends.
Having said this, I haven't always done this. I studied a Business/IT degree even though my real talents and interest lay in software development. At the time I didn't realise what I was doing. The degree that I studied came with a scholarship and the money helped make a real difference. I also didn't realise what I was missing. No one ever bothered to say "Hey your good at this. Did you know that there is all this other stuff that you may also be interested in..." I ended up doing well in my degree and getting a job that I hated. Being a proactive person within 6 (painful) months I got myself another scholarship and went back to uni to learn as much of "the other stuff" as I could. The only problem was that I was now doing it on my own. If I had my time again I would choose to do a technical IT degree, and do IBL to get some extra $.
Anyway the question remains, should you follow your interests (and talents), or study areas which have job shortages and hope to build interest and talent? What are your thoughts on this?
Tuesday, May 09, 2006
Talents
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8 comments:
I'm in a job I hate, well, dislike a lot, with a company I equally dislike. It is an absolute chore every morning to get up and go to work. Alas, I'm a bit old in the tooth to change careers now.
So, go with your talents, or more accurately, with what you enjoy doing. After all, you could be doing the same thing for forty years.
Roll on retirement ...
"I studied a Business/IT degree even though my real talents and interest lay in software development. At the time I didn't realise what I was doing. The degree that I studied came with a scholarship and the money helped make a real difference."
That sounds exactly like my story. I've found so far that I've been able to keep up my technical skills through my electives (why I'm doing ent .net), and also through just coding at home. And as you say, the money helps a great deal.
I guess I'll probably change my stance when I realise what job prospects I'm left with.
(Last post was by Xavier)
The course I did was good, for what it was. Just not something that really helped build my core strengths and interests.
The enjoyment that I find in programming is not from the code, but from the end result. No matter how impressive a piece of technology may be, until you use it in some way that does something great, it’s meaningless to me.
In the end, I want to be Steve Jobs, not Steve Wozniak.
It's because of this that I have a harder time knowing exactly where I should be.
At least I'm not in the it for the money (though the scholarship certainly is useful).
The business focused IT degrees are about working out what the company needs. The technical focused IT degrees are about building what the business wants.
If you like working out what is needed then the business focused degree will be good. If you want to be able to create solutions for these needs then a more technical degree may be more applicable. Each degree has a bit of the other in it...
it's a bit funny actually, cause sometimes when students go into uni, they don't always know what they are good at or what it is they like. i started an electrical engineering degree, and loathed it with a passion. what i learnt from the degree however, was that i enjoyed the programming aspects, so went hunting for a degree which would match my interests.
sometimes you have to go into uni and study what you don't like to find out what it is you do like.
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