Mar 07, 2017 07:51 AM EST By Emily Marks, UniversityHerald Reporter

Graduating from college and beginning your professional journey is an exciting time in every young employee's life. However, there will be challenges ahead and it's important to get an inkling of what career path you truly want to take before applying for a job.

The first question that fresh graduates, and even those who are still in college, should ask themselves is what they want to achieve a few years ahead in their career, according to Lifehack.org. It's important to focus on our long-term goals instead of just making decisions based on what they want for now.

In a piece for The Muse, via Forbes, Jennifer Turliuk, CEO of MakerKids, a company that provides STEM programs for kids, said that a lot of people put in more thought and effort into getting the job rather than knowing if that particular job was something that they actually wanted to do. She spoke with international career expert John Krumboltz, a professor of career coaching at Stanford, about the dilemma of how to know what she wanted.

He explained that she should test out the various career experiences that caught her interest. Moreover, she should do this in the "most low commitment way" as possible for each option.

She advised people who are stuck in a career rut or those who are still starting out to pick a few things that they wanted to do. From there, try out those experiences by finding mentors who are willing to be shadowed for a short period of time.

Turliuk also noted that she wanted to be passionate about her work and be able to pass on the same passion to others. This is another great question to ask yourself to know which career path you should take.

While not everyone can have the same experiences as Turliuk, it's all about finding what works for you. Before fresh graduates start on their professional journey, they should take some time to take a step back and evaluate where they want to be a few years from now.

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