Career Training: The Best and Worst of Summer Jobs
Turning good—or bad—summer jobs into full-time careers
By Kimberly Brandes
Everybody's favorite season evokes strong memories, and summer jobs are no exception. Love them or hate them, summer jobs are a necessity for most students, providing extra money for road trips and frozen drinks and beer as well as essential career training to strengthen their resumes.
Typically, the best summer jobs provide relevant career training and introduce the importance of professionalism when working with people. With career education goals in mind, learn what others' temporary job experiences taught them about the reality of the working world. Find out how some turned their summer jobs into a dream job, while others discovered their strengths and passions from bad summer jobs.
From Shop Assistant to Fashion Merchandising
Currently a fashion merchandiser for an upscale clothing retailer, Sarah was a business major when she took a summer job working at a specialized woman's boutique. As each new shipment of clothing arrived, she fell in love with helping clients accessorize and inventing outfits for the store windows. While Sarah may not have realized it at the time, she was amassing knowledge about textiles, fabrics, running a small business and the intricacies of customer service.
Once she returned to school, she was inspired to add a concentration in fashion merchandising to her career education goals and hopes to open her own boutique one day. This summer job gave Sarah career information she still uses, including sales skills, effective time management and the power of dressing professionally.
From Child Care to Elementary Education
Like Sarah's experience, the best summer job provides practical career information, which can be especially helpful when your career path is not clear cut. As the oldest sibling in her family, Beth always knew she was capable of handling children, but she never realized she wanted to develop a career out of it until she took a summer job as a nanny. She found that she loved working and playing with children, watching them grow and learn.
For Beth, the decision to become a teacher was a natural progression, and she is now enrolled in a program to pursue elementary education. Her experience as a nanny gave her hands-on career training and taught her the responsibilities and joys of working with children.
From Deli Plates to Graphic Design
Not everyone's work experiences are positive. A bad summer job can make minutes seem like hours, but it might teach you things you a few things about what you truly enjoy. Jason, a senior designer at a marketing firm in Chicago, says his worst summer job was at a grocery store deli. At first he loved being able to eat whatever he wanted, but he quickly grew tired of the food and the monotony of the job.
After long hours of slicing meat and cheese, Jason realized that what he enjoyed about the job was creating colorful and innovative party platters and working with the customers. Upon returning to college, he mentioned this in passing to his career counselor, and she suggested a career in a creative work environment. In the end, his boring summer job motivated him to pursue interesting, creative work in graphic design.
From Hair Salon Gossip to a Psychology Career
Often, the most valuable lessons in career education come in surprising packages. Jessica's worst summer job was working as an assistant at a local hair salon. But being on her feet all day, sweeping hair off the floors, removing rollers, washing towels and cleaning the bathroom was just not her style. However, as she got to know the clients, she found she had a gift for listening to people talk about their day-to-day problems, such as issues with family, their relationships or work troubles.
These daily interactions led Jessica to realize that helping people with their problems was what she wanted to do with her life. She was inspired to develop new career education goals, and she is currently working on her degree in psychology.
Summer All Year 'Round
Summer jobs not only pad your pocketbook, but they can give you insights into yourself and your career potential. Finding the career that inspires and motivates you can make going back to school as fun and interesting as summer vacation.
Education majors will learn crucial leadership skills by working at a children's day camp. For those who plan on pursuing career education in a medical field, working as a lifeguard will provide career training opportunities and sharpen emergency-response skills. Students who are simply interested in networking and gaining life experience can utilize websites such as coolworks.com and coolsummerjobs.comm that advertise unique job opportunities at exclusive resorts and national parks.
Those lucky enough to find a great job hardly miss the lazy days of summer, because they are busy learning professional and technical skills that bring them one step closer to their career goals. Whether it involves flipping burgers or interning for the Trump organization, any summer job is an excellent introduction to effective time management, working with a team and handling stress. At the very least, it provides some extra income for next semester's late-night pizza orders.
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