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Actually, I have some misunderstandings about career planning. Either I think that career planning is just unreliable grand theories, or I believe that career planning should be like fortune-telling by masters, pointing us in a clear direction. Now, we need to try to reach a consensus on two basic questions of career planning so that we can better continue with the upcoming courses. What are these two basic questions?

The first is: What problem does career planning aim to solve?
The second is: How should we effectively apply the principles of career planning?

In essence, these two questions are: What is it and how to use it? To help everyone better learn this course, I have created some very exquisite images. Now, I would like you to look at this picture. What I want to tell you is that the core issue that career planning aims to solve is the match between people and jobs, matching individuals with careers.

The aspect of people is not simple. There are at least six elements that may affect your career decision-making. The first element that influences decision-making is your personality: Are you more introverted or extroverted? Are you straightforward or meticulous? These will certainly affect your career choices.

Then there are your abilities: What are you good at? Or what potential do you have? What can you do well in the future? This is quite important.

There are also your resources: Who are your parents, what background do they have, how much money can they provide you, what connections can they help you with, which university did you graduate from, in which city are you located, and who are your friends or teachers, etc. All of these are your resources.

Then there are your personal interests: What do you like to do, or what do you particularly dislike doing? These will also influence your career choices.

Of course, another very important factor is your values. Do you care about money? Do you care more about freedom or money? Do you prefer a more comfortable job or a more stressful and stimulating one? Do you like a more challenging life or a more conventional one? These are all influenced by your career values.

There are also some important others whose opinions may influence you, such as your parents urging you to pursue further studies or take civil service exams, even if you don’t want to, but you are used to obeying your parents and caring about their feelings. Or if there is a powerful person in your family who can provide you with opportunities, you might choose such a job for the sake of family interests. All of these are possible.

These are the personal factors.

Then there is the career world: What kind of industry do you want to work in? The finance industry, fast-moving consumer goods industry, education industry, etc. These are all industries.

Then there are companies: large companies, small companies, state-owned enterprises, foreign enterprises, private enterprises, and even government agencies. These are all choices of companies.

Also, what kind of position do you want to hold? Human resources, finance, technology, product manager, etc. These are all choices that need to be made and judged.

Additionally, there is the income of this job: how much does this job pay per month, how much will it earn in three years, and how much in ten years?

And the work environment: What is the company environment like? What is the industry environment like? Also, what future development opportunities will this job have? If done well, what opportunities might arise in the future?

Simply put, you might realize: Wow! The match between people and jobs in career planning is really not simple! Indeed, doing a good job in career planning is not an easy task. Because what kind of person you are, not only do I not know, but perhaps even you do not know; you need to explore yourself.

Besides exploring yourself, what is your career world like? You still need to explore.

In fact, no matter what kind of person you are, regardless of the opportunities in your career world, when we are doing career planning, we have only two action strategies. If you do not act according to these two action strategies, then no matter how much you understand the principles of career planning or the methods of career planning, it will be meaningless.

What are these two strategies?

They are: vision-based strategy and resource-based strategy. What is the difference between them? It’s simple. If you have a clear and heartfelt career goal, then you should act according to the vision-based strategy; if you do not have a particularly clear career goal, then you should act according to the resource-based strategy.

The third image has a table comparing these two strategies.

Let’s first briefly discuss the vision-based strategy: Some people, I can only say some people, have a clear career goal. For example, wanting to be an entrepreneur to make big money, wanting to be a lawyer, a judge, a diplomat, a university teacher, etc. These are all relatively idealistic goals.

Its characteristic is that the goal is very clear, so the path will be very clear. How to become a lawyer? Take the bar exam, then intern at a law firm, and gradually become a lawyer. The growth paths for careers like judges, diplomats, etc., are all clearly defined.

Acting according to one’s vision, these visions are usually more idealistic and lofty, requiring us to spend a lot of time and energy to accumulate.

The vision-based strategy is particularly suitable for careers with high thresholds, where education and knowledge accumulation, and technical requirements are high, such as lawyers, university professors, financial analysts, etc. If a career has a low threshold, we generally wouldn’t consider it a vision, for example, most people would not consider buying insurance or driving a taxi as ideal careers.

In short, if you have a heartfelt ideal career, you should act according to the vision strategy; this is your optimal career planning strategy. You must not think of becoming a university teacher while not wanting to pursue further studies; this is having an ideal goal but not wanting to put in the effort, and the result will inevitably fail.

The second strategy is: resource strategy.

What I want to tell everyone is that the vast majority of people do not have a very clear career goal. Among the 100 people I have interacted with, no more than 10 have a clear career goal. This is actually normal; the vast majority of people do not know what they really want. They may understand and be interested in many things, but to say they really like them may not be the case.

At this point, we must act according to the resource-based strategy. What is the resource-based strategy? Do not desperately seek to figure out what job suits you or what you want to do; you may not be able to think it through. You should act based on the resources available to you in reality.

This means looking at what job opportunities are available around you, first choosing the best one, and trying it out. The goal is to enhance your abilities, broaden your career perspective, and then try for better jobs.

The resource-based strategy is more pragmatic and highly efficient. The outstanding university students and accomplished corporate executives I have encountered all follow the resource-based strategy: seizing any opportunity to grow and continuously embracing new opportunities. This is actually the career planning strategy that suits most people.

So, today I will start by understanding the industry. Why not start by understanding yourself? Here’s a little teaser; I will tell you more in the upcoming courses.

The first concept I want to clarify for you is: we need to see clearly the relationships between industries, companies, and careers. Please look at the image below my audio; I have drawn a particularly elegant sketch.

Here, I want to explain the relationship between industry, company, and career through a river, a boat, and a little person.

If each of us is sitting in a boat, heading towards the distance, then the river determines how large a boat can be on this river, decides whether our future will be stable, and how far we can go. This is the industry; the industry determines our long-term career development and the achievements we can attain.

Besides the river, the size of the boat itself, how sturdy it is, and the captain's skills will all affect our experience while sitting in the boat. A 10,000-ton oil tanker and a small wooden boat are certainly different. The boat represents the company, which determines the speed of our growth.

What role do we play on this boat? Are we the captain's assistant, or are we in the engine room stoking the boiler? This role directly affects our experience on the boat. This is our role in a company; different roles will have different job contents.

I want to convey the importance of industry, company, and career through this simple cartoon. So, in this lesson, we will start discussing the industry.

Please look at our third photo; we can see a comprehensive analysis of careers: industry, company, and position. Very few people think about their career choices from the perspective of the industry. Those who can have this perspective will have a more obvious advantage in career development because they have a clearer understanding of their company and position, making their actions more likely to succeed.

Please look at the fourth image; this is an official classification code for national economic industries. Here you can see I, G, K, L, P, and R, which I have marked in red. The industries marked in red are those whose growth rate exceeded GDP growth last year.

This means that these industries belong to those that are developing relatively quickly, with concentrated resources and good prospects. What do the black ones represent? They are either retreating or stable, basically failing industries. This tells everyone the basic state of the industry.

Within this, there is a developmental stage of an industry. Generally speaking, we can divide an industry into four stages: dawn period, sunrise period, maturity period, and sunset period.

Now let’s look at the seventh image; this image shows four key elements you must know about the industry: the size of the industry, which is the annual output value of the industry, who the top three companies in the industry are, who the industry leaders are, and what associations exist in the industry. These things are not hard to find; where can you find them?

I have prepared methods for you; please look at the eighth image. I will briefly go over it; you can visit a website called Mobile Observation Station to obtain industry data reports for free.

Next, look at the ninth image, called Longyuan Journal Network. This is a website where you can read electronic journals online; it’s quite good (though it may cost a little, it’s actually very cheap). You can learn about some information about the industry; each industry generally has its own related magazines. Check out the companies and people that frequently appear to gain a basic understanding of the industry.

Of course, another place to learn about the industry is China National Knowledge Infrastructure, which has many papers on topics like travel, education, etc. You can find relevant papers to study industry reports. For example, I have prepared a screenshot of an industry report for you, which shows the current trend in the tourism industry; everyone can take a look.

What kind of boat should we board?

There are many types of boats on the river. We can make a basic classification. Please look at the exquisite photo I prepared for you. From the perspective of organizational attributes, we can roughly divide the boats on the river into three types: political, commercial, and academic. We can understand that these three boats belong to three different factions. As a newcomer, you can basically only choose one faction to join.

Political means becoming an official, working in civil service; commercial means entering enterprises, state-owned enterprises, private enterprises, and being part of the working class; academic means pursuing further studies, becoming a professor or researcher, etc. In fact, every country has these three paths: political, commercial, and academic. However, in developed countries, there are not strong barriers between them, and at a certain stage, it is easy to cross over.

For example, Schwarzenegger is considered a star abroad, right? He can become the governor of California and enter politics. Trump was originally a businessman, a real estate tycoon, and now he is the President of the United States.

However, in China, it is very difficult to achieve such crossover; the barriers are extremely high. Therefore, in most cases, when we Chinese people choose jobs after graduation, we can basically only choose one of these three paths to walk to the end; it is very difficult to switch paths halfway.

Different paths require grasping different cores. Politics requires grasping power, needing strong wisdom and skill; it is difficult for ordinary people to manage. Academia requires grasping new knowledge, which requires strong learning and critical thinking abilities, which are also not common abilities. Business requires grasping economic benefits, which varies from person to person; in fact, most people still choose the commercial path.

Please look at the fourth exquisite photo I prepared for you. We can classify all the organizational types we can choose from the perspective of the system into eight types. From left to right, the left side is the largest and most stable, while the right side is the smallest and most flexible. The left side is government agencies, followed by public institutions, state-owned enterprises, foreign enterprises, large private enterprises, small and medium-sized private enterprises, startups, and finally freelancers.

I think anyone who wants to enter a company after graduation can only choose from these eight types. These eight types are actually very different from four dimensions.

• The first dimension is the entry qualifications. The entry threshold for government agencies on the left is the highest; they will examine your education, background, political status, and even your family background, etc. They will pay more attention to these, so the entry threshold is relatively high. Freelancing has the lowest entry threshold; if you set up a stall at your school gate or open a milk tea shop, you are a freelancer, and there is almost no entry threshold.

• The second dimension is organizational characteristics. Government agencies are the most stable work institutions; changes in leadership are still rare. The further right you go, the smaller the organization size, and it becomes relatively more flexible; a small boat is easier to turn around.

• The third dimension is the nature of the work. Work in government agencies is usually quite conservative and emphasizes stability because it involves too many interests and the interests of the people, so often they cannot do anything too outrageous; it is usually quite conservative. However, freelancers, startups, or small and medium-sized private enterprises are more daring to challenge and constantly break through because they need to meet market demands.

• The fourth dimension is the core of the work. In different organizations, the core of their work is very different. Especially for government agencies, public institutions, and state-owned enterprises, they are resource-oriented. Where are the resources for government agencies? As Secretary Gao Yuliang said in "In the Name of the People," in Chinese politics, usually, the top leader holds all the resources. In government agencies, if you want to advance and obtain resources, you must manage your relationship with your superiors well. Therefore, in state-owned enterprises, the most important thing is to look up, not to look at users. However, in freelancing, startups, or small and medium-sized private enterprises, everything is oriented towards users, focusing on results. Selling out, gaining more traffic, and better reputation are the core of the work. From these four different dimensions, we can see some obvious differences in characteristics among different organizations.

Next, let’s look at the fifth image. You can see the matrix of entry requirements I prepared for you for different organizations. Through this example, you can observe what kind of path you are suitable for.

Our entry requirement matrix mainly has four parts: practical experience, comprehensive quality, educational background, and professional matching degree. These four elements can be classified from the dimensions of controllable and uncontrollable, low accumulation cost and high accumulation cost.

Overall, if you want to go to government agencies, public institutions, or state-owned enterprises, they usually have the highest requirements for educational background; this is a hard threshold, and they usually do not require too much practical experience. You can see that after entering a state-owned enterprise, the first two or three years of work are quite basic, such as organizing documents and writing reports. Therefore, it does not require you to have relevant work experience; rather, you need to have a clean background or a high educational background, or you need to have passed the civil service exam, etc.

But what do private enterprises care about the most? They care the most about practical experience: whether you have done this job before. Private enterprises emphasize efficiency. If a person has not done this job, they will have to spend a lot of time slowly teaching them. Private enterprises will not have the impulse or willingness to teach you from scratch, so they always emphasize that candidates with relevant work experience are preferred during recruitment.

What do foreign enterprises care about the most? They care about comprehensive quality: some prestigious foreign enterprises not only require you to have an impressive educational background, study abroad experience, etc., but they also require you to have relevant work experience, and even your major must match, and they may even have requirements for your image and temperament.

After understanding the different organizational types and the entry requirement matrix, the most important thing we can do is to judge what kind of current situation you belong to and in which aspects you have advantages. For example, if your educational background is good and your comprehensive quality is also decent, then you can consider going to a foreign enterprise. If your educational background is not particularly good, then it may be difficult for you to enter government agencies or foreign enterprises; in this regard, you do not have a competitive advantage. If you are a person with rich practical experience, such as having done many internships during university, then you may have an advantage in working for private enterprises. The earlier we understand the entry requirements of different organizations, the earlier we can see our current situation and prepare in advance.

If you are still a university student and plan to take the path that most people take, which is to go into business, then please look at the sixth image. I strongly recommend that during your university years, you participate in internships in this way: for example, work in a large company in an auxiliary position, doing some assistant roles, or similar to an HR intern position. It is said that Siemens' HR intern position is relatively easy to get into (and Siemens is also a Fortune 500 company). After working in an auxiliary position in a large company, for your second internship, you can consider going to a large company's business position, such as sales, marketing, operations, product intern, etc. Essentially, these positions are also particularly beneficial for personal development.

Let’s first talk about the safety type: the safety type means entering state-owned enterprises, public institutions, central enterprises, etc. What are the benefits of this choice? This choice will be a clear high start and low walk. If you enter a state-owned enterprise through various exams and some connections right after graduation, you will definitely be envied by your classmates; your work and household registration can be settled, and you may even get a house in the future. You feel like you have reached the peak of life right after leaving campus. But don’t be in a hurry; this is a typical high start and low walk situation! Because entering a state-owned enterprise is quite good at first, but after 3-5 years, you will find that your growth and promotion are very difficult, and your growth is slow, and you won’t learn many practical skills.

Moreover, what’s even scarier is that the skills you learn in the system have little real value in a socialist context. Because many people in government agencies do similar things to administrative assistants in large private enterprises, such as being secretaries for leaders, organizing materials, and writing reports. Your opportunity cost is very high; you may work in a government agency for 5 to 10 years and still be a department head. However, within those 5 to 10 years, perhaps your classmates who were not as good as you when you graduated went to a private enterprise and became directors, or even started their own businesses and made a lot of money!

So if you choose the safety type and enter a state-owned enterprise right after graduation, you need to be aware that you may experience a high start and low walk; this is something you need to pay attention to.

Another type is the stable type: graduating and going to some large foreign enterprises or large private enterprises. For example, companies like Alibaba and Taobao are excellent large private enterprises, and so is Tencent. The reason for going to such companies is that they are relatively wealthy, and their organizational structure is quite sound; you will grow faster there, and the salary will not be too low. At this point, your career risk is also relatively low; after all, having worked in such a large company, your salary will also be higher when you go to a smaller company.

Another choice is the risk type: going to a startup with only three to five hundred people or even fewer right after graduation, or simply becoming a freelancer. This may be a faster way to grow because in a small company, one person has to take on multiple roles, and growth will be relatively fast. Generally, such companies tend to make more money; as long as they are somewhat reliable, startups are usually willing to pay, possibly even more than those large companies, but the risks are also higher because the company could collapse at any time.

Because I do not understand your personality preferences and ability levels, overall, I suggest that everyone adopt a method of starting in the middle and gradually adjusting. At first, go to large private enterprises or foreign enterprises to train your professional abilities well; then start adjusting to see if there are opportunities to enter government agencies or start your own business. Starting in the middle and gradually adjusting is encouraged; I do not recommend entering a state-owned enterprise right after graduation, nor do I encourage starting a business right after graduation.

Please look at the image; after entering different companies, pay attention to their different characteristics. When going to large companies or large foreign enterprises, be sure to pay attention to the business departments. Many large companies, although impressive, often have some strategic departments that can be very poor.

For example, if you go to a company like Sina, you should definitely be in the department related to Weibo. If you go to the department related to Sina Games, then you may not be in the core department. Understand? This is something you need to pay attention to; choosing the right department in a large company is very crucial.

If you go to a small company or a startup, my advice is to be very picky about your boss. The boss of a startup is extremely important; the boss determines the life and death of the company. Therefore, if you go into a startup, you must look at your boss with an extremely critical eye. Check if they have worked in a large company, if they have started a business before, if they have succeeded in their ventures, and what their relationship with investors is like, and whether they can quickly secure funding.

I strongly do not recommend university students to start a business right after graduation. Because the success rate is very low, and the first two years of work are your golden years for career growth! Instead of starting a business, it is better to work in a large company for two years, save some money, and build a network before considering starting a business.

The third point I want to emphasize is that if you enter a government agency and take the civil service exam, you must pay attention to the different functions of different government agencies. You need to focus on your function; working in the statistics bureau is completely different from working in the human resources department. This means that different organizations need to focus on different priorities.

Please look at the ninth photo; next, I will tell you how to understand a company.

There are many unreliable methods, as well as many reliable methods. Unreliable methods include: Have I heard of this company? Are there any impressive gossip or is the name very impressive? Also, salary: Is the treatment high? You must be very cautious. If a small company offers you an unrealistically high salary, nine times out of ten, it is a scam.

The reliable information I have listed for you. Please look at the image I prepared for you: this image is very, very important. If you use this image well, you can avoid many troubles. Moreover, you can use these tools and methods to quickly understand this company during your interview and impress the interviewer. You need to understand the industry rankings, the company's system and capital, and if the company is publicly listed, its annual reports, official website, official WeChat, APP, employee self-media, etc., all need to be monitored.

Where can you obtain this information? I have also displayed it on the 11th image; you can check these websites and forums to learn more.

Finally, I want to tell you how to choose a company. Here are three strategies for making choices. The first is to start from life pursuits.

Starting from life pursuits, you need to try to ask yourself this question: What kind of life do you want to live in the first five years after graduation? Is it conventional? Comfortable? Or changing? Challenging? Note that why it is the first five years after graduation; I want to tell you that when we choose our first job, we must not think that we will do this job for the rest of our lives, forever in this company. This is a very immature thought. You only need to consider whether you want to strive or be comfortable, whether you want to take risks or be conventional in the first five years, and then choose an organization that suits you.

The second is to start from career pursuits. What kind of problems do you want to solve for what kind of people? What is your dream? What do you want to change in this world? Start from your career.

The third, which I think is the most pragmatic and reliable, is to start from the opportunities at hand. Understand what your best choice is at this moment. Which company seems to rank higher in the industry? Which company offers you more money? You can consider going to that company.

The Schein's Cone Model is based on the three-dimensional cone model of employee career development proposed by E.H. Schein, a professor at the Sloan School of Management at MIT, a renowned career management scholar. Employee career development within an organization is represented by vertical, inward, and horizontal paths. The "vertical" development path refers to the promotion or elevation of positions, specifically manifested as "position change development," where employees continuously move from a lower position to a higher one based on the needs of organizational development and the career ladder set by the organization.

Understanding oneself is not an easy task; there are six elements we need to consider: personality, ability, resources, interests, values, and the influence of significant others.

In this lesson, we will focus on exploring ourselves from three dimensions, which I call the career clover. They are interest, ability, and value.

As an experienced career planner, when I do one-on-one consultations with seekers who encounter career confusion, I usually do one thing: I ask questions from the perspectives of interest, ability, and value. I will ask them, "How do you feel about the work you are doing? If you were to rate your satisfaction with this job from one to ten based on interest, what score would you give it?"

After discussing interest, I will say, "Do you think you can handle your current job? If you can handle it completely, that would be ten; if you cannot handle it at all, that would be one. From one to ten, how would you rate your ability?"

Then we have the third question: "Do you think you can gain what you want from this job? If this job can fully meet your various needs, that would be ten; if it cannot meet your needs at all, that would be one. From one to ten, what score would you give it?"

What I want to tell you is that any job's interest, ability, and value will directly affect our satisfaction with that job.

When we are interested in a job, we will naturally enjoy doing it. If we are not interested in this job, we will feel a strong sense of boredom and dislike. This feeling is like a student who is tired of preparing for the college entrance examination; it can be very exhausting.

Holland's theory was proposed in 1959, about half a century ago, after World War II, when the industrial society began to emerge. The American career planning master Holland proposed the theory of person-job fit. He classified workers into six basic types, and corresponding careers were also divided into six types. If you are this type of person, you will naturally be suited for this type of work.

Holland's theory of career choice, also known as Holland's vocational personality theory, is one of the classic theories in the field of vocational psychology. Holland believes that people's career interests and personal traits can be divided into six basic types, and each type matches certain work environments, job contents, and job natures. Successful careers often depend on the degree of fit between the individual and the work environment.

Holland's six career types are:

1. Realistic (R): Prefers concrete, practical work and hands-on tasks. Typically enjoys mechanical, tool, or outdoor activities and excels at solving practical problems. Suitable careers include engineers, technicians, construction workers, etc.

2. Investigative (I): Enjoys thinking, analyzing, and researching, focusing on problem-solving and acquiring knowledge. Suitable careers include scientists, researchers, doctors, programmers, etc.

3. Artistic (A): Enjoys creative, expressive, and art-related activities. Pursues a free and independent work environment; suitable careers include designers, artists, writers, musicians, etc.

4. Social (S): Enjoys helping others and interacting with people, caring about others' needs. Suitable careers include teachers, psychologists, nurses, social workers, etc.

5. Enterprising (E): Enjoys leading and influencing others, focusing on business goals and goal-oriented work. Suitable careers include managers, salespeople, entrepreneurs, lawyers, etc.

6. Conventional (C): Prefers orderly work environments and excels at following rules and organizing tasks. Suitable careers include accountants, data analysts, administrative assistants, etc.

Holland proposed the concept of person-job fit, which means that there is a matching relationship between each person's career interest type and specific work environment types. According to his theory, career choice is not only a reflection of personal interests and abilities but should also consider the characteristics of the work environment. By understanding one's career interest type, individuals can choose career paths that match them, improving job satisfaction and work efficiency.

Additionally, Holland's theory emphasizes the "similarity principle," which states that the higher the fit between the individual and the work environment, the better the individual's performance and satisfaction in their career will typically be. The career matching model can help individuals choose the most suitable career direction and help organizations find employees that best meet their needs.

Holland's Career Types and Their Matching with Work Environments#

• Realistic (R): Matches with Realistic work environments (e.g., technology, machinery, agriculture, etc.).
• Investigative (I): Matches with Investigative work environments (e.g., scientific research, technology development, etc.).
• Artistic (A): Matches with Artistic work environments (e.g., creative design, artistic expression, etc.).
• Social (S): Matches with Social work environments (e.g., education, healthcare, social services, etc.).
• Enterprising (E): Matches with Enterprising work environments (e.g., business, sales, management, etc.).
• Conventional (C): Matches with Conventional work environments (e.g., administration, accounting, data management, etc.).

By understanding these six types and their matches, individuals can gain a clearer understanding of themselves and choose more suitable careers. At the same time, for organizations, understanding how different types of employees perform in different work environments can help improve team efficiency and employee satisfaction.

To accurately position your career, you may need to have a deep understanding of not only yourself but also the profession and the work environment. According to Holland's theory, both individuals and professions can be classified into six types: Realistic (R), Investigative (I), Artistic (A), Social (S), Enterprising (E), and Conventional (C). When the individual type matches the career type, the individual will feel a sense of achievement in the work process and be willing to further improve.

I have prepared the ability golden triangle model for you, which divides abilities into four parts: knowledge, experience, skills, and talents.

You can see that knowledge and experience are at the top; without knowledge and experience, you will not be able to develop skills, and without skills, you will not be able to develop talents.

We write these five contents on our resumes: one is work experience; how well did you perform in your previous jobs? This is a very important part. Or if you have not worked yet, how was your internship experience? Secondly, there are project experiences; next, there are social experiences. What have you done in society? Internships, volunteer teaching, etc., or other business activities. Then there are campus experiences, which include entrepreneurship competitions, school competitions, scholarships, etc. Learning experiences include academic performance, GPA, etc., and scholarships are also included in learning. These five aspects are worth writing well in your resume, but their value in your eyes or in the eyes of HR is different. In HR's eyes, work experience is the most valuable. The least valuable, or relatively low value, is academic performance. However, for the vast majority of people, whether they are university students or newly graduated job seekers, what do you have the most of? It is learning experiences. What do you have the least of? It is work experiences.

From this image, you can also see that for the vast majority of university students, what you should accumulate the most may not be your academic performance or campus experiences, but your social experiences or even your internship work experiences. I hope to convey this through this image.

In simple terms, there are three main sections: one is career-related, one is project-related, and one is student-related. Let’s start with some things you are more familiar with that are student-related. These include student unions, clubs, etc. If you organized some club activities during your university years, such as hosting an event for two hundred people that received school coverage, these are all achievements worth writing about. If you have done some volunteer work, such as teaching in remote mountainous areas, or if you have participated in hosting or volunteering at school or city-level or higher-level meetings, these are all volunteer experiences worth writing about, including some overseas experiences, such as exchanges, study tours, or volunteering abroad, etc.

Next, there are some project experiences during your university years. For example, competitions; universities hold various entrepreneurship competitions every year, many of which are entrepreneurship competitions, right? Or some technology competitions or writing competitions. As long as you participated and achieved good results, you can write them here. There are also some research projects; if you have collaborated with your mentor to write something or some papers, or published articles, these are all worth writing down.

In simple terms, there are three main sections: one is career-related, one is project-related, and one is student-related. Let’s first discuss some student-related matters that you are more familiar with. These matters include student unions and clubs. If you organized some club activities during your university years, such as hosting an event for two hundred people that received school coverage, these are all achievements worth writing about. If you have done some volunteer work, such as teaching in remote mountainous areas, or if you have participated in hosting or volunteering at school or city-level or higher-level meetings, these are all volunteer experiences worth writing about, including some overseas experiences, such as exchanges, study tours, or volunteering abroad, etc.

Next, there are some project experiences during your university years. For example, competitions; universities hold various entrepreneurship competitions every year, many of which are entrepreneurship competitions, right? Or some technology competitions or writing competitions. As long as you participated and achieved good results, you can write them here. There are also some research projects; if you have collaborated with your mentor to write something or some papers, or published articles, these are all worth writing down.

Now, here is a revised version I helped her with; everyone can take a look. "Responsible for operating the 'Shaoyi' self-media, editing texts, and publishing original content to WeChat public accounts, Toutiao, Jinshuju, etc., with a total reading volume of 580,000, obtaining Toutiao's original qualification within half a month, possessing multi-platform operation experience." When I say this, you might think, "Wow! Her abilities are quite good; she can get things done." Why do you have this feeling? It is because she followed at least five of the six elements of achievement events. First, let’s break it down; what is the first element? "Action." What is action? It is "responsible for operation," right? Action is what you are responsible for or what you did; you participated in doing something, right? "Behavior" refers to what specific things you did in this process. I wrote for her, "Editing texts, publishing original content to WeChat public accounts, Toutiao, Jinshuju, etc." This is the specific behavior, right? The third element is "Tools." Here, I did not help her write about tools, but tools can also be added, such as "I edited texts using tools like Xiumi Editor and Chuangketie to publish content to..." This can also be added.

Okay, the fourth element is "Data." "Reading volume of 580,000" is a very good piece of data. Through such reading volume, I can roughly guess that her articles must have been published well, that her titles must have been good, and that her formatting must also have been good. This will give me a very good impression of her; data is very important. The fifth element is "Impact." Impact refers to what kind of recognition you received after completing this task. "Obtained Toutiao's original qualification within half a month" is also a small achievement, right? Finally, what did you gain? After completing these tasks, what did you gain? "Possessing multi-platform operation experience." I believe that if I were a company recruiting an operations intern and saw such a resume, I would definitely be impressed, right? It is certainly much better than what she wrote before. This is the six elements of achievement events; it can quickly turn your achievement events into a way that HR can understand and is willing to read, making it more professional and career-oriented.

To deepen your understanding, I will give another example; please look at the image I prepared for you, which illustrates the six elements of achievement. I will use an example of one of my students who worked as a marketing specialist at an English training institution in Beijing, essentially helping them with student recruitment. He mentioned a lot; he formed a small team and completed the recruitment task by attracting 100 people through early-stage flyers and private messaging, achieving 40 people from two schools, and ultimately increasing the number by about 10. He gained knowledge from the team, learned how to manage himself, and how to manage others. These details are already better than what the previous student wrote about operating; he has data and results, right? However, it still does not fully reflect that this is your achievement event.

Now let’s take a look at another student of mine. After my guidance, he wrote his resume like this. First, let’s look at the "Action." What did he write? "Founded the Zhongshan OPPO entrepreneurship team," "Led thirty people in product promotion, sales, and planning." What is this? This is specific behavior. "Implemented over 30 promotional activities, selling a total of 188 phones, with sales amounting to 520,000." Here, you can see that there are many numbers; this highlights the importance of data. What is the result? What is the impact? "Ranked among the top three schools in Dalian, earning the opportunity for public funding to study at OPPO headquarters." Everyone can see that this segment of the resume is clearly written, with clear data, defined responsibilities, and outstanding results. My student achieved this resume and got a job at Baidu before graduation.

What are the three degrees? He wants to see your fit with the position through the interview, then your satisfaction, and finally, your loyalty.

What is fit? It is whether your abilities can meet the requirements of this job, whether you can do it well, and whether you will run away after a couple of days of work. This is fit. The second is satisfaction: can you do this job well, or do you recognize this work? Can we reach a cooperation and understanding between us? Satisfaction and loyalty refer to how long you can stay in this position and whether you can continue to create value here. This is loyalty.

Fit is usually assessed through achievement events to demonstrate your abilities, right? Satisfaction is usually assessed through value, which means whether you are worth cultivating and whether it is worth collaborating with you; at this point, your work attitude is mainly considered. Loyalty is assessed by your values, which involve your career personality and career pursuits. These three major points are what we need to demonstrate during the interview process when facing a desired job: we need to showcase our fit, satisfaction, and loyalty.

So how do we face the interview?

We can divide interviews into three major categories: one is structured interviews, which include first, second, and third rounds of interviews; the second is pressure interviews, where you face several interviewers at once. The third type is the leaderless group discussion, which is also a common interview type, usually used by large companies such as state-owned enterprises, central enterprises, or Fortune 500 companies. Here, I will focus on the first two types of interviews.

The first type of interview is the common interview type, structured interviews.

Structured interviews usually consist of four rounds. The most standard structured interview has four rounds. The first round is the preliminary interview stage, mainly to assess your professional qualities. The employer or interviewer will mainly examine your mental outlook, demeanor, and basic communication skills, as well as your willingness to work and how well you have prepared for the job. This is usually the focus of the first round of preliminary interviews!

The second round of interviews will assess your professional knowledge, such as your professional abilities, how you performed in university or your previous job, your learning qualities, and whether you have relevant insights and experiences. This is usually the focus of the second round of interviews. The second round of interviews is also the most challenging one. If you pass the second round, you will enter the next round, which is about cultural integration. This assesses your ability to integrate into the company culture and team style. Can you recognize the corporate culture? Does your working style align with the team’s style? This is what will be emphasized in the third round of interviews.

The final round is the final interview, which usually involves a final risk assessment, discussing your career plans, checking your fit with the company, and understanding your family and partner's expectations, which may influence your long-term career development stability!

We know that most companies will have several rounds of interviews; some companies may pursue efficiency and simplify the process, combining several rounds into one, or even having only one or two final rounds of interviews, which is understandable.

Next, let’s look at pressure interviews. Pressure interviews usually also occur in structured interviews, where one faces multiple interviewers. Typically, the group involved in decision-making includes HR, department heads, or mid-to-senior level managers. In pressure interviews, they mainly assess satisfaction, loyalty, and fit. They will use a seemingly stricter environment to evaluate you, so at this point, you need to pay attention to several points:

First, you need to be aware of your professional thinking and awareness. What is professional thinking? Professional awareness includes the mindset and ability to complete tasks. This includes preparing your resume with good examples. You need to express yourself clearly and concisely.

Second, you need to understand the company’s business. In every internship or interview, you must understand the company’s business. Before the interview, you must understand the company’s business, seek similar experiences, or learn from friends and family if they have similar experiences to share.

Third, everyone must pay attention that at any time during the interview, the interviewer is not primarily looking at whether your answers are appropriate; they are first looking at whether you can maintain a relaxed and confident state in the face of this kind of pressure. This is very important!

These five dark moments: what are the five dark moments? One is the novice period, one is the skilled period, one is the team leader period, then the business leader period, and finally the company leader period. On our career path, we must evolve from a novice to a company leader. This process is particularly like a martial arts master starting as an unknown apprentice, gradually challenging formidable opponents in the martial arts world, and slowly becoming the supreme master. This is a path of growth. You might say, "I don’t want to be a company leader; I think it’s too tiring. I also don’t want to be a team leader; it’s really too hard." You can think this way, but the result will be that your career rewards will definitely not be particularly high.

Next, we will focus on the characteristics of these five dark moments, interpreting them from five dimensions: one is the growth process, the core contradictions, key behaviors, evaluations from superiors, and erroneous behaviors. If you can see clearly these five dark moments, your career development path will become very clear, and you will know what to do at each stage.

Let’s first discuss the novice period. The most important thing during the novice period is to seek survival. If you have just joined a company and have not been there long, the most important thing for you is to establish your footing in the company. At this time, you should work actively and diligently. You should aim to receive evaluations from your leaders such as, "This person is very down-to-earth, works very hard, and is willing to take on tasks." At this time, you will usually gain more opportunities, and leaders will be willing to mentor you, allowing you to build better relationships with colleagues, which is very important.

The erroneous behavior during this period is to always feel that this job is not suitable for you, that it is meaningless, too simple, or too trivial, always thinking of escaping, wanting to do less, and believing that it is not worth the effort. If you exhibit this kind of behavior, you will remain in the novice period for a long time, making it difficult for you to achieve greater development because others will find you unreliable.

Once you have passed the novice period and performed well during your internship, gaining recognition from your leaders, you will transition from a novice to a skilled worker. At this point, your core task is to strengthen your abilities. In the novice stage, you relied on hard work; you didn’t have much ability because you didn’t know much or couldn’t do much. Just working harder than others was enough. However, once you reach the skilled stage, you must have your own abilities, methods, principles, and attitudes toward solving problems. This is the manifestation of ability.

At this point, you need to perform better than the experienced employees around you; this is the key. Usually, during this time, leaders will find you quite excellent, performing better than your colleagues. At this point, you become a good skilled worker. The most fearful thing at this stage is that when you first join, you are full of enthusiasm and eagerness to do many things, but once you get used to it, you start to feel that everything is similar and that doing just enough is fine. If you remain at the skilled stage, one or two years later, you will feel very painful because you will find that those who joined with you may have already been promoted and received raises while you are still at the same stage, leading to dissatisfaction and thoughts that this job is not suitable for you. In reality, it is not that the job is unsuitable for you; it is that your abilities are insufficient.

If you can develop your abilities during the skilled period and have your own methods of working, consistently exceeding expectations, you will then begin to move towards the third stage of growth, becoming a backbone of the team. To become a backbone, you need to start taking on more opportunities and tackle challenging tasks. What is seeking business breakthroughs? If you are in the skilled stage, leaders will like to assign many tasks to you because you can do them better, but these tasks often do not hold much value!

If you want to become a backbone, you need to start delegating these less valuable tasks to others and focus on the newest and most challenging business tasks. At this point, your core task is to optimize your work efficiency.

You must simplify complicated tasks and delegate simple tasks to your subordinates, interns, or new colleagues to optimize your efficiency. At this point, leaders will recognize you and feel that you are particularly excellent; they will trust you to handle tasks independently. However, you must be cautious.

If you have become a business backbone, leaders will always trust you and be willing to let you take on tasks, granting you more authority. At this point, you must be vigilant not to become complacent; you must continue to work diligently. If you have become a business backbone, the next step is to become a business leader, capable of independently leading a team to achieve business goals. This is very important. Simply being a specialist is not enough; you must also be able to manage and lead people while ensuring the company meets its KPIs.

Superiors will find you very excellent; what should you do if you are not? The most erroneous behavior at this point is to think that you are not good at dealing with people, that you are not suitable for leadership. In fact, it is not that you are unsuitable; rather, we often like to view things we cannot do as things we do not like. This is a mistake; it is because you have not prepared adequately and your abilities are insufficient. Therefore, do not just be a specialist; if you want significant career development, learn to manage and lead people.

The final part is becoming the company leader. The core contradiction for a company leader is no longer doing the work; you should be setting strategic directions. Your key behavior is to integrate resources internally and externally. You must ensure that your investors or shareholders see you as someone capable of achieving results. The most erroneous behavior at this point is to get involved in the actual business.

If we can see clearly that we must go through these five dark moments in the workplace, we will understand that the career path will become increasingly difficult. Although it becomes more challenging, you must know that your rewards will also increase. When you are a novice, you are basically earning the lowest salary in the company. When you are skilled, you will generally have an opportunity for promotion and salary increase. If you want to achieve financial freedom, you must be a leader in a business sector, capable of handling responsibilities independently. If you want to achieve wealth freedom, you must be a company leader; only then will you see significant growth in your rewards.

If we can see clearly these five dark moments, we will know which stage we are in on the timeline, what tasks we need to accomplish at each stage, and prepare for the next stage. We cannot rely on the efforts of the first two years of work to rest for a lifetime; in this era, that is almost impossible.

A core key is the intersection of interests; you and your leader are a small intersection of interests. You need to learn to see them clearly and think and act within this intersection of interests to seek a win-win situation. Next is how to handle your relationship with your leader. Remember my four tips: one is to learn to deliver, the second is high return rates, the third is to obey management, and the fourth is to become a mentor and mentee.

How to handle relationships with colleagues? Three principles: limited exposure principle, offering small favors principle, and seeking collaboration principle. Finally, I will also tell you about refusal. What is the mindset of refusal? Remember, I am not someone who must comply with every request. The mantra is to let me think about it, along with the three methods I give you. I believe that as long as you skillfully apply these three methods in your work, you can become an efficient and harmonious professional in the workplace.