Where do you see yourself in 10 years?
Another common interview question is where do you picture yourself in 10 years?
Other variations of this question include:
- What are your career goals?
- What’s your Life Goal?
What are they looking for?
They are looking for:
- Goal-orientated student
- Ambition. Somebody who has ambitions to accomplish things.
- Realistic Expectations. They also want to make sure that you have realistic expectations. They don’t want you coming in saying “I want to take over the world”. They also don’t want you to come in and say ’10 years from now, I hope to be playing video games and living in my parent’s apartment. That is not what they want.
Here is How To Answer It
- Understand Your Career. First of all, you need to understand the career path for the major that you are going into.
- Pick A Realistic Goal. You also need to pick a realistic goal, pick something likely to happen for somebody going into that career path in 10 years.
Example
Here is an example for somebody interested in pre-med. You might answer this question by saying:
"10 years from now I'd like to be in a printing position and by then, I hope to have accomplished a pre-med program at your university. I'd like to have done my medical studies, my internship, my residency and be establishing a practice. Right now I am not sure what the practice is going to be but I am genuinely interested in general practice because I like the idea of helping an entire family.
So I like the idea of general practice where I can be working with kids, I can be working with adults as their primary physician.
That is a very realistic objective. Somebody who is going into pre-med in 10 years could be in a practising position.
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What you should not say is:
I want to be leading the neuron surgery department for the largest medical centre in the country.
That is not realistic, that’s not something someone 10 years out of high school is going to be accomplishing.
Another example.
Here is an example of somebody who is going into computer science. You might say:
"In 10 years, I will like to be the manager of a small coding department. I like the idea of working in a small company, a very innovative company, a company that is doing new apps that people would love. So, between now and those 10 years, I will like to complete my education in computer science at this university. I'd like to get a job as a coder so that I can be developing my skills and then work my way up to a manager level so that I can be leading a small team of people developing apps.
Again, that is very realistic and it shows some ambitions.
When you are answering this question, make sure you indicate:
- Leadership Role: make sure you show that you want to be in a leadership role. Universities are looking for leaders, you don’t want to be the president of the United States, you don’t want to be the CEO of large cooperations because those are unrealistic. You whoever want to be leading projects and potentially managing people.
- Making a Contribution: also show that you want to be making your contributions. Universities like students who have an interest in others and helping others, so in your answer, make sure that 10 years from now, you are helping people.
What you should not mention in your answer to this question include:
- Overly Ambitious. You don’t want to be overly ambitious. You don’t want to say you are taking over the world.
- Vague. You shouldn’t be saying 10 years from now, I want to have a job that I like and then start up a family. A job that you like is not an answer that provides any direction. It doesn’t show that you have any specific ambition going into the university.
Pick something specific, pick something that shows you have ambitions and not unrealistic expectations.
