It is widely understood that our brains change as they develop; the teenage brain is very different to the adult brain, notably with decisions and emotions being led via the amygdala rather than the prefrontal cortex, which finishes developing at about the age of 25.
This is often presented as a deficit for “good decision making” especially in regard to risky teenage behaviour, such as substance or alcohol misuse and aggressive behaviour. However, what if within a career development context, this wasn’t the only perspective we could take?
Within this context, is there an argument to be made for risky decision making being a positive rather than a negative? Hear me out whilst I explain.
Risky decisions
Teenagers make decisions that aren’t always thought through and are, at times, very risky. Many of us know the understandable worries and concerns around substance misuse, dangerous driving and similar life-threatening behaviour. Yet we often don’t consider how this type of risk-taking decision making applies to young people exploring their career choices and options.
A common narrative is for adults to support young people to make “informed choices” and to challenge the thinking of the young person, to help them weigh up their choices and make (hopefully) balanced decisions, which are right for them.
However, many young people have limited experience of work and different workplaces. Even the most “informed” decision, whether choosing a job, apprenticeship, university or college course is, in many cases, made based on limited experience or knowledge of what the opportunities are like. Even if books have been read, open days attended, work experience completed and the internet scoured, it doesn’t completely prepare individuals for the reality of a specific job, course or working environment. It could be argued that this understanding can only come from first-hand lived experiences, developed over time.
The experiences of others (often well-meaning adults), although useful, don’t always translate well to the young person and often come with inherent bias. My mum often said that, “I had to learn some things for myself and that what is right for one person, isn’t necessarily right for another.” This is something that applies to career development and decision making.
Therefore, many young people, knowing that they have limited knowledge or understanding, “take a risk, a gamble, or a punt” on the choices they make post-16 and post-18. In this context, the ability to leap rather than get locked into a spiral of indecision and inaction could be seen as useful.
Leaping
From one angle, taking such a leap is hugely risky (it could of course go wrong), but from another angle, it is incredibly enabling for the young person. Perhaps the support provided by the adults in young people’s lives should be around not just helping them to weigh up their choices, but also encouraging them and enabling them to leap and take their first career steps despite their lack of lived experience.
I have seen adults locked into indecision in their own careers. At the same time, I have seen young people make huge leaps into the unknown – some without a backwards glance or even thought that what they are doing could be risky. In an odd way, naivety may be the very catalyst needed to leap.
It raises the question – would our young people take such leaps (as they do on a regular basis) if they didn’t have (“risky”) brains driven by their amygdala?
I have met many adults (older than 25) who struggle to make risky decisions, possibly because their brains have settled and, for many, have more to lose on a chance or risky decision, such as inability to pay their mortgages or the loss of a stable income.
Socio-economic constraints
There is another perspective to this; those young people who have a broad financial and familial safety-net can more easily take these leaps of faith, if they know that they won’t be potentially homeless if the leap fails. The extent to which these safety-nets exist varies considerably.
I have worked with many students whose financial safety-nets are limited, so when it comes to considering choices, such as whether to go to university, they sometimes reach the point where to dare is too much of a risk. Whereas those with greater financial safety-nets (often via family) are more likely to take a leap based on faith and/or limited research.
- For example, when a graduate job isn’t guaranteed at the end of a leap, for those who dare with lower financial security, the risk becomes much higher. For some of these students, a guaranteed income from an immediate job post-18 instead of pursuing university is preferable as the perceived risk is lower.
- Others are far more diligent with their research and will check the earnings of possible jobs far more carefully and will look at statistics regarding whether one choice (university or apprenticeship, for instance) will lead them to well-paid career or not.
To make such a leap then, is it desirable to have a brain that is open to “risky decision making?” (This will give you a metaphorical mental push.) Or can such a brain lead to too much of a risk in the longer term, especially if financial security is limited? The answers to these questions are in shades of grey. The complexity is that we don’t know until afterwards which leap will be risky and which won’t. Which gamble will pay off and which won’t. Conversely, to play it too safe sometimes isn’t the safest decision either; the young person could end up trapped in a life they did not want, thereby affecting their mental health and wellbeing in the longer term.
To fail is to learn
Research tells us that through trying – and sometimes even failing – is how we learn and grow (developing stronger neural pathways). It is for this reason, among others, that the ownership of career decision making must remain that of the young people we support. Despite the desire to protect our young people from risk and harm we might see them doing to themselves and their careers in the short term, even in the act of “failing”, they will learn how to live.
It is through this adversity that broader life skills, such as resilience and even motivation, can develop. Within my own career journey I can see how periods where I ended up unemployed or in jobs I didn’t want motivated me in the longer term to find my place. I am, however, aware that this isn’t the same for everyone and some find themselves trapped or in a downward spiral in such situations.
For anyone caught in these circumstances, it is important that they access suitable support and professional career guidance, to help them explore different ways forward and reflect on what is possible. Importantly, a qualified career development professional won’t tell them what to do, but rather provide time, space, information and guidance to help them consider their options and find solutions.
We can’t live the lives for our young people, we can only guide and encourage them to leap when they are ready, whilst doing our best as a society to simultaneously celebrate those who leap and succeed and build safety-nets to help catch those who leap but don’t make it, mitigating the worst of the consequences if things do go wrong.
If you are looking for a qualified career development professional to help with a young person’s next steps, contact the national careers service in your home nation or search the Career Development Institute (CDI) Register of Career Development Professionals.
Please note: The thoughts and ideas expressed in this article are my own and don’t necessarily represent those of my employer.
© Chris Targett
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