Confused with Careers..help?

Question

I graduated with a B.S. in Criminal Justice from an unknown college in Southern California and do not want to pursue that field anymore. I've been in the restaurant industry for 3 years already, and have been a supervisor there for 6 months. I'm on my way to become a restaurant manager but I'm not sure if it is the right path to take. Ultimately I want to get a MBA or go to grad school, if I could re-do my whole college life, I would want to major in either engineering, IT, or business. But since I can't turn back time, what is the best route for me? Restaurant managing provides a decent salary and benefits, but I don't want to get stuck as a manager for the rest of my life. Any suggestions or thoughts? Any will help, Thank you!

Answer 1

I can only suggest as to what you can do if you want to explore IT. You should start to learn a web technology and then convince your restaurant somehow to invest in IT or if your restaurant already has an IT asset then you can take two roles voluntarily at the start such as IT assistant and restaurant manager at the same time and can continue to drift toward IT gradually. On a more optimistic note; after learning at least one set of web technologies, you can look for an IT job in the restaurant industry at a different restaurant. Once you get hold of this IT job, then take out time and money to go to grad school.

Answer 2

For right now, go to a bookstore and get a GMAT or GRE practice book. That should give you a good idea of whether you're ready to apply.  A restaurant job with unusual hours?  You can take college courses part-time during the day and manage the restaurant in the evenings.  A newly minted degree is a great way to break into a new field, which necessarily means breaking out of your old one.

But now the what.  Do you know what you'd like to go for grad school for?  Because you don't only need to know.  You also need to make sure that your professors and advisors know too.

Even if you're not ready, prepare an application and send it out as soon as possible.  The worst that can happen is that you're out the application fee.