How to choose a career for yourself

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When It Comes to Careers, Change Is a Constant

Apparently, it is one of the toughest and most crucial decisions (apart from choosing a life partner) that each one of us take in our lives. You can be at any stage of your life – a professional working in the field for several years – trying to do something new or just venturing into the practical world after finishing your education; determining your career path can prove to be an extremely overwhelming process.

There are hundreds and thousands of career options. And with the advancements in technology, social media and online interfaces, newer careers have boomed in last few years. The more choices we have, the more anxiety it causes us and the more we fear the consequences of making the wrong decision. We have a natural tendency to not want to close doors, so instead we will scramble back and forth to keep each option open “just in case.” Instead of helping us, this leads to a debilitating sense of indecision.

 

For most of us, our career paths are predetermined. Predetermined by parents, friends, peers, society and circumstances. As a child, we swim (or just try to) in the river, which our parents and society trust is the best path to our successes. We are told how to keep afloat and follow the pack and what our goals should be. Our job isn’t to think about our path—it’s to succeed on the path we’ve been placed on, based on the way success has been defined for us. Now, some of us develop passions and interest on the path they are put onto and make successful careers; whilst others are left pondering on their career decisions. But everyone, (including the successful ones) should pause and introspect if it was really them who chalked out their career paths? The map of your career path should be self designed.

With a little self-exploration and some research, you can easily choose a career that will leave you feeling fulfilled.

Ideally, everyone would know their true calling early in life and find happiness in their work, but it often doesn’t work that way. One survey (of New York professionals) found that they expected to change careers three times in their lifetimes; lifelong careers may not be the norm any more.

Here is what you can do:

Identify your skill set : Evaluate yourself on the various aspects where you are good at. Ask friends, family, colleague for their inputs and narrowing down your strengths.

Jot down your interests and passions: Enlist the things you love to do. It could be sculpting, nature walks, travelling, volunteering, building things, woodcraft etc.

Determining the Option Pool: Bringing together your wants and the reality (skill set), you get a pool of practical options for your career choice.

Be lead by your own aspirations and not societal expectations: Your career choice should be an informed personal decision based on a thorough knowledge of your own strengths, skills, interests, style and values; and not what society expects to become or do in life.

and most importantly,

Believe in yourself!

 

For more information about our Online programmes that can help shape your career; download the catalogue.

 

 

Organisational Behaviour and its Importance in Management

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“There are only two ways to influence human behaviour: you can manipulate it or you can inspire it” – Simon Sinek, Author, Motivational Speaker and Marketing Consultant

Understanding why people behave the way they do and studying the complex nature of human being in an organisation is important to better manage and increase the value of the human capital in an organisation. Organisational Behaviour helps us understand this by studying the cause and effect of human behaviour within an organisation.

Some of the reasons why Organisational Behaviour is an integral part of most management programmes is as follows:

  1. Understanding the relationship between an organisation and its employees: The study of Organisational Behaviour helps in the better understanding of the relationship between an organisation and its employees thereby helping in the development of better Human Resource strategies in creating a better work environment, employee loyalty and increasing the overall value of the human capital for the organisation.
  2. Motivating employees: Studying Organisational Behaviour help managers to better understand their employees and motivate them, applying different motivational tools as per individual requirements resulting in the better performance of the organisation as a whole.
  3. Improving industrial/ labour relations: Organisational Behaviour help in understanding the cause of a problem, predict its future course and control its consequences. As a result, managers are able to maintain better relations with their employees by nipping any problem in the bud.
  4. Effective utilisation of Human Resource: Knowledge of Organisational Behaviour help managers to effectively and efficiently manage their employees, inspiring and motivating them to higher efficiency and productivity through a better understanding and analysis of human behaviour.
  5. Predicting human behaviour: This is probably the most important reason for studying Organisational Behaviour in management. Knowledge of Organisational Behaviour prepares students to become better managers by becoming a student of human behaviour from a management perspective and thereby contributing to organisational effectiveness and profitability.

Robert Kennedy College with almost 14,000 students from almost every county in the world offers one of the most diverse, accredited and globally recognised online master’s degree programmes in both Business Law, Leadership and Management through exclusive partnerships with British universities. For more information download programme catalogue.

Master’s…Now or Later?

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A majority of the people struggle with this question, whilst contemplating to pursue a Master’s: should they start their Master’s now or later? Being at different stages of their lives, prospective students find the reasons to postpone the Masters primarily are lack of time (they have full time and demanding jobs), their jobs require them to travel a lot, lack of money and family responsibilities. So when is the right time to pursue your Master’s? Right after you finish your undergraduate degree? Or rather wait for couple of years and then become a student again?

There are on set ways and either approach works for different people.

Advantages of starting your Master’s right after finishing your undergraduate degree:

  1. Still in a habit of studying : People start working right after undergraduate degree to earn a salary, support life-style, family, buy house etc. and the delay becomes indefinite. When you start your Master’s early, you are still habitual to studying, attending classes, submitting assignments, without having to worry much about other chores of your life.
  2. Peer Support: Everything gets harder as the time flies. Generation gaps are huge these days, even between first and second year students. So when you start early, you will find peers of your age and generation and the support and understanding is better.
  3. Be able to plan ahead and define better goals: After completing your undergraduate degree you have a fair idea of what you want to do and where you want your career to head. A Master’s degree will help plan your future better and give it a definitive direction in the field you want to be in eg. Finance, Healthcare, Media, Human Resources, project or Information systems management.
  4. Give you an edge in job market: Appearing for a job interview and having a Master’s degree already on your resume, will give you an edge and put you way ahead of others.

Advantages of starting your Master’s later in your professional lives:

  1. Switch careers: This is one of the most popular and easiest way to switch your careers to different fields, no matter what stage of your career you are in. You can start alternate careers or even enrich your existing jobs with new knowledge of the Master’s degree.
  2. Fund your Masters: When you have worked for a couple of years, it becomes easier for you to fund your Masters’ yourself or even secure an education loan. You find yourself in a better position financially.
  3. Build a valuable experience: Most of the students studying online bring with them vast seas of practical knowledge and add to the quality of the course in group assignments, interactions, and discussions. You are able to apply the theoretical knowledge of the course to the practical business world in real time with the online programmes.
  4. Clarity of life and career: you would have a better vision and aim for your life and know exactly where you want your career to head.

 

Download our course catalogue, and speak to our advisors today about the next intake.

Doing a Masters without a Bachelor degree

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Postgraduate study usually requires an undergraduate (Bachelor’s) degree as a prerequisite – but if you haven’t completed an undergraduate degree, earning a Master’s qualification isn’t out of the question.

There are a number of criteria that a university might take into consideration when evaluating an application for a Master’s degree programme. Some universities insist on a Bachelor’s degree from a recognised and accredited university. However this should not dissuade you from applying for a Master’s degree as the long term professional benefitswill stand you in good stead, and a large number of universities will take into account your professional experience and other certificates and diplomas in lieu of a Bachelor’s degree when considering your application.

Here’s how to get your Master’s without a previous undergraduate degree.

Leveraging your professional experience – The best way to learn is to do! There will be a number of concepts that you learn in your Master’s programme that you might have already executed in your professional life to great success and yet be unaware of the theories, best practice or the full practical potential of the concept. But having already executed the concept and seen it work (or fail), your knowledge of the concept will put you equal to if not steps ahead of a Bachelor’s graduate who has joined a Master’s programme directly after graduation. The knowledge you have gained through your time in employment or self-employment may prompt a university to consider you favourably for a Master’s degree in lieu of a Bachelors’ when considering your application.

Other Education/ Professional Certificates or Graduate Diploma – There are a number of reasons why a person might not have completed their Bachelor’s degree. Maybe at the time of your Bachelor’s programme you were only able to attain a graduate certificate or a diploma, or maybe you were unable to enrol for a Bachelor’s programme in the first place due to personal or financial commitments. But It is a fact that the only way to continuously and consistently grow in your professional life and have a successful career is to keep updating your knowledge and to this end you might have accumulated a number of professional certificates which testify to your knowledge and professional expertise. It is such knowledge coupled with your professional experience that a university might take into consideration when evaluating your application for a Master’s degree programme.

Robert Kennedy College with almost 14,000 students from almost every county in the world offers one of the most diverse, accredited and globally recognised online master’s degree programmes in both Business Law, Leadership and Management through exclusive partnerships with British universities. For more information download programme catalogue.

Sustainable Leadership

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” Good Leadership is a lifelong leadership process. The best leaders know the difference between a dream and                            a purpose  and they learn to follow their purpose” – Mama Jan Smith

Leadership is defined as the ‘action of leading a group of people or an organisation’.

In today’s complex business world where businesses are multifaceted and multicultural; leadership definition has taken a whole new level. Leaders are not only expected to ‘lead’ a group of people but also effectively manage and influence the group towards goals and values which are sustainable and contain a vision for the future.

YSJ - RKC - MALIC Signing

“Earn your Leadership Everyday” – Michael Jordan

Leadership is not confined to the top levels, to people with a ‘C’ in their business designations. To be successful, organisations need leadership ‘at all levels’ of operation. Leaders at all levels critically convert ideas to reality through far-sightedness and actively engaging in their environment.

Leadership ‘remains the No. 1 talent issue facing organizations around the world.’  Finding good leaders has, of course, always been a crucial issue for all sorts of organizations. This is why the armed forces, for instance, put so much effort into training their officers and why business schools and other providers of executive development have thrived. But the ’21st century leadership is different’.  Companies face new leadership challenges, including developing Millenials and multiple generations of leaders, meeting the demand for leaders with global fluency and flexibility, building the ability to innovate and inspire others to perform, and acquiring new levels of understanding of rapidly changing technologies and new disciplines and fields. No wonder organizations are coming up short.

At University of Cumbria, we offer MBA in Leadership and Sustainability and MBA Media Leadership programmes that cater to the increasing demand of distinctive managers with the aim of developing a unique leadership-oriented career opportunity.

Click here to know more about our programmes.

Benefits of joining an Accredited University

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A degree can have a significant impact of your career aspirations, from the opportunities extended to the salaries offered. However, your choice of university or college will have a major influence of these career opportunities. As more universities begin to offer degree programmes online, it’s especially important to know which ones provide the academic excellence desired by many employers.

The quality of your education is probably the most important consideration in making your decision as regards a college or a university, after all you will be investing a substantial amount of your time, effort and money in obtaining this degree and will be expecting a return on your investment.

Due to technological advancements and a growing need for organisations to have a qualified workforce, the number of universities and colleges that offer online programmes to meet this requirement have increased dramatically over the last few years. However not all programs deliver an excellent education.

Accreditation means that an institution was evaluated based on specific guidelines. Some of the benefits that an accredited university offers are:

  • To ensure that education provided by institutions meet an acceptable level of quality
  • Facilitate a graduate’s entry into certain licensure and certification programs
  • Ensure a university honours its promises to students
  • Monitoring and Improving education standards

Recruiters place importance on credentials and will likely verify whether a school is regionally accredited and this can have a direct impact on not only whether you get the opportunity offered but on the salary that is being offered. So ensure the degree programmes you consider are offered through a respected – and accredited – educational institution.

From the student perspective an accredited university will help you stand out from the competition when applying for the best jobs and give your prospective employers the confidence that you possess the skills and education they are looking for.

Robert Kennedy Collegewith almost 14,000 students from almost every county in the world offers one of the most diverse, accredited and globally recognised online master’s degree programmes in both Business Law, Leadership and Management through exclusive partnerships with British universities. For more information download programme catalogue.

Future of Healthcare professionals

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HEALTHCARE INDUSTRY – STA·TUS QUO

Demand for healthcare services has unobtrusively risen over a period of time now and this growth will continue into the future. The demand for services translates into ever-increasing demand for healthcare workers – including nurses, physicians, allied health professionals, technologists and coders, leaders, and support personnel. Like any other industry, it’s an upward trend in the long term, for the healthcare sector employment. However, the healthcare industry does not seem to be prepared enough to cater to this increasing workforce demand. Increasing demand has been accompanied by a growing number of unfilled jobs, a serious challenge that can be perceived in the federal labor data and on the digital job boards of hospitals and health systems, where hundreds and even thousands of open jobs are posted. Both growth trends and growth challenges will continue into 2018 and beyond.

WHERE IS THE FUTURE?

The amount of money that is projected to be spent on healthcare in the future, is cogent indicator of rising demand for healthcare services and healthcare workers. More than doubling from 2010 to 2025, when it reaches beyond $55 trillion, expenditures include payments for all healthcare costs, including pharmaceuticals, equipment and technology. However, labor constitutes the single greatest cost for most healthcare organisations.

This growing trend, has translated into a flurry of jobs openings in the healthcare sector. Even in 2017, despite the continued debate over the future of healthcare policy, the healthcare industry has added an average of 24,000 jobs each month. That’s vigorous growth in any industry. Employment growth is expected to continue for the foreseeable future. While healthcare job growth will ebb and flow in the future, the trajectory of growth has been consistently upward.

HOW CAN YOU FIT IN THE DEMAND SUPPLY GAP?

While job openings have ascended steadily over the years, the job hires remained relatively static. Traditionally openings have outpaced job hires in healthcare and the gap between openings and hires has been widening rapidly since 2014. This swelling gap – which represents a cumulative number of unfilled jobs – shows the challenges that healthcare providers face in finding enough practitioners and support personnel to fill today’s job openings. Other data reveals that the problem of high demand for healthcare workers, and low supply of those workers, may continue well into the future. The statistics on the projected future job openings  provides the healthcare providers the crucial insight on the demand for healthcare services and healthcare professionals. These are the jobs that healthcare providers will need to fill in the future.

At Robert Kennedy College, we offer Online MBA International Healthcare Management Programme, in exclusive partnership with University of Cumbria, UK. Recognise the workforce shortage in the healthcare sector and be there where there are abundant jobs. The MBA IHM could prove be the key to your success and better future. Click here to receive the course catalogue and get a chance for free trial offers.

Advantages of an Online Education

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An on-campus education offers a number of traditional benefits – from access to the infrastructure of the university, face-to-face interaction with the faculty, and better networking opportunities with your peers, to on-campus placements and career opportunities.

However, with the access given us by technology these “traditional benefits” are no longer unique to an on-campus education.

Most universities that offer an online programme usually give their students access to their online libraries. These online libraries usually come better stocked with a wide range of reference papers and ebooks as there is no physical space required for the library and these online libraries can be accessed by students at any time and from anywhere in the world.

A number of online education institutions have also adapted video communication tools like Skype, Facetime, etc., to give a virtual classroom experience to their students. Through these virtual classrooms students can interact live with the faculty and fellow students, discussing subjects, answering questions and experiencing a classroom environment from the comforts of their homes.

Through social media, students and institutions have created a more extensive and robust network than anytime before in history, creating platforms for not only the sharing of ideas and discovering partnerships but also creating and broadcasting job opportunities that might have otherwise have gone unnoticed.

Another advantage of an online education is that most of the students who enrol in a programme also have a full-time career and are pursuing their education parallel to career and life commitments in order to enhance their career prospects. Having to effectively manage work, life and education has the added benefit of making a student learn to manage time better and become more self-disciplined.

In today’s global village, organisations are truly multinational and technology plays a vital part in the decision-making and communication process of an organisation. Having completed an online programme, students are prepared for this modern business environment, with familiarity in online communication and information platforms and learnt skills in online research, data mining and appropriate writing etiquette.

Robert Kennedy College with almost 14,000 students from almost every county in the world offers one of the most diverse online master’s degree programmes in both Law and Business through exclusive partnerships with British universities. For more information download programme catalogue.

Achieving the perfect Work-Life-Study Balance

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If you are looking either to advance in or to switch careers; online education can help fastrack your career goals. An online student today, typically is a 34 year old, employed in high demanding jobs.

Juggling a career with education is a challenge.

Today, given the flexibility of online education, it’s no surprise that – it’s those very working professionals who are drawn to the virtual classroom.

 

Apart from making the decision about the choice of the University and choice of the course that you want to pursue, another major decision that most of our prospective students face is time-management and achieving that perfect work-life-study balance. Apart from money, time is the biggest commitment that you are going to make towards your Online Education. You may already be running deadlines at your workplace and at the same time have to keep up pace with Online lectures and ensure timely submission of assignments. Studying while working will require some sacrifices, particularly in your social life.
 
Finding this balance is becoming harder, not easier. ‘Healthy mind in a healthy body’ is one of the most popular slogans we have always heard; more so because it is so sensible. Both the mind and the body’s health is optimised by balancing your work life with your personal life. So here are few quick pointers that will help you maintain the most crucial balance of – work-life-study:
  • Make lists – Be organised and make lists of things to be done at work, study and home.
  • Set Goals – Set achievable goals and targets for yourself.
  • Manage your time – Plan your whole work/study week and what you have to accomplish really helps.
  • Do not Procrastinate – Do not leave things to last minute.
  • Do not succumb to pressures – There will always be work pressure. Studying will only add to the already sweltering pressures. Keep your calm. Remember that you are only a human and it is only so much you can do in a 24hour day. Divide ample time to your personal life as well after work and study.

 

Pursue your goal for higher education with Robert Kennedy College Online Masters’ Programme. Download the catalogue.

 

Advantage in having Student Diversity

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The world has become a smaller place, a global village and organisations have truly become multinational. Today’s managers must not only know how to manage business at a global level but also understand the nuances of doing business at local level.

Diversity in your college in terms of race, gender, religion and other factors has a positive impact on all students. Diversity enriches your experience by exposing you to a non-homogenous composition of students as an introduction to the cultures of the world and so to a richer learning experience.

This exposure will also create a diverse learning experience providing:

Greater Self-Awareness – Joining a college that has a diverse student base exposes students to a wide spectrum of cultural and life experiences, shattering preconceptions and prejudice and enhancing the overall learning experience.

Knowledge and Critical Thinking – The course curriculum is not the only source of knowledge in college. The opportunity to interact with diverse peers, leads to greater active thinking, intellectual engagement and motivation.

Global Perspective – In today’s global business environment with clients, suppliers and employees from all over the world and different backgrounds, an exposure to a diverse college environment lays the foundation for a global perspective and builds the social abilities needed to interact productively with individuals of various nationalities and backgrounds. The experience will enhance your career prospects because you are prepared to face opportunities you may not otherwise consider.

Social Development – Interacting with students and faculty from different national and social backgrounds will not only create a global network but will be enriched with diversity. This diverse exposure will also create a diverse learning experience providing the socialisation skills and knowledge which would otherwise have been out of your comfort zone.

Collaboration – A study conducted by researchers at the University of Wisconsin-Madison found that ideas generated by diverse teams were of better quality in terms of feasibility and effectiveness with input from individuals of diverse backgrounds and perspectives that otherwise would not have been raised.

Robert Kennedy College with almost 14000 students from almost every county in the world offers one of the most diverse online Master’s degree programmes both in Law and in Business through exclusive partnerships with British universities. For more information download programme catalogue.

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