Paying for Career Planning

Now I understand the critical career planning article I mentioned in an earlier post. Apparently, the April 25th Washington Post included a piece about the rise in career counseling services for kids. The article highlights efforts by the Boys and Girls Club, College Recruiter and others. The story mentions some positive and negative points of career planning. However, it is an overwhelmingly positive story. The main critiques: career planning places too much stress on kids and kids need life skills ed, not career planning. Isn't finding and keeping a job an important life skill? I'm taking great pleasure in this increased attention to career planning. I'm even excited about the critical commentary. Who knew people are think about this enough to form an opinion? I'm no Pollyanna. The career counseling field has a great deal of variety in quality. (For an in-depth look at this, you must read Barbara Ehrenreich's book, Bait & Switch.) I'm also a little nervous about services that promote 10-year plans for teens. (See Career Choices website. Upon closer inspection, it's not nearly as scary as it sounds. They aren't asking kids to make a one time decision that will limit choices. They're aligning education and career interests. I think they have a marketing problem, not a product problem.) One of the themes of the article is that career planning is an emerging industry. There's an increased consumer interest and lots of emerging efforts to meet this market demand. This is good and bad news for consumers. More choices means more tough decisions. How do you choose wisely?