How High School Jobs Teach Successful Habits

How High School Jobs Teach Successful Habits

The rumor that after-school or summer jobs distract teenagers from schoolwork and extracurricular activities is far from true. Holding a part-time job actually helps teens become more successful in other areas of their life! They’ll learn valuable life lessons that will help them in all areas of their life, following them from their adolescent years and into adulthood. Here are a few reasons it’s a good idea for your teen to get a job.

Jobs Teach Financial Independence

When your teen finds a job, they learn the responsibility required to budget their money. As adults, we all know this is an important skill to have in life. Balancing expenses like groceries, rent, electrical bills, and saving money for vacation and leisure activities are all things your teen needs to learn firsthand. The Bank of Mom and Dad will eventually run dry, so the sooner your teenager starts earning their own keep and learning how to use money wisely, the more successful they’ll be later in life! Plus, your teen will be more stressed in college and future life stages if they don’t have prior experience budgeting and handling money.

Jobs Open Teenagers to New Experiences

First jobs are an awesome source of inspiration for all teenagers. They allow teens to meet people from other walks of life, learn new skills, and develop creative problem solving skills that are bound to help them later on. Work experiences can even be great to incorporate into your teen’s college applications, as universities often like to see that high schoolers take initiative outside of their school’s extracurriculars. Your teen could easily write about challenges they overcame and hardships they faced balancing work and school, which will demonstrate responsibility to colleges! Jobs are environments for teenagers to grow and learn more about the world, which will give them a more unique voice and perspective than their peers. This is a great asset to have, no matter if they’re applying for college, or other future jobs!

Jobs Teach Balance

The key to living happily and successfully is having a well-rounded life, which means doing other things than just studying and getting good grades. And, like all things, it requires practice to get it right. If your high schooler doesn’t know how to balance work and school responsibilities, they’ll struggle later in life when their income becomes a more important part of living. Even though school is important, your teen needs to learn to value other parts of their life. Adding a job to your teen’s schedule will help them learn how to juggle multiple projects at once, which is something all future adults need to know how to do. Whether your teenage is volunteering or getting paid a decent wage, their experience working adds a lot to their character.

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Jobs Teach Leadership Skills

Once your teen gets out of high school, colleges and future jobs are looking for people with important leadership abilities. In a college, for example, there are tons of student workers that help make everything from the cafeteria to administration run smoothly. Colleges are often looking for students who have prior experience and are comfortable taking the reigns in a work setting. How will your teen learn these valuable skills without any previous work experience? Having a job in high school will make your teen a prime option for running student organizations such as service clubs, club sports, and more, which will lead to success down the road. These are the teenagers who prove they know how to meet professional goals, which will make them more appealing to companies and employers after college is over. But it all starts early, and your teen can get a jump on the competition by having a job!

Jobs Teach Time Management

Throughout life, your teen will be confronted with learning how to balance a lot of different tasks, which will come easier to them if they already know how to schedule their time between work and school. With class schedules meeting throughout different parts of the day, your teen could be at a loss when deciding how to incorporate social time, chores, or campus activities. The time management skills they will get from having work in high school while their brain is developing will give them more confidence to plan out their day and take on more responsibilities to be successful and efficient. Budgeting time to relax is just as important as budgeting time to work, and the extra work from having a job will teach your teen to spend their time wisely.

Jobs Teach Business Etiquette

Many students who leave college or high school for the professional world don’t know the first thing about how to formally interact with businesses and employers. You don’t want your teen to embarrass themself during their first interview, and having an entry-level after-school job will give them practice behaving in a professional environment. When your teenager has to meet with people in high positions later on, it helps for them to know how to properly speak with professionals. This is a skill that will be invaluable during job interviews as well as learning how to appropriately network later in life. Being courteous and professional can seriously impact someone’s career prospects, so it’s good to learn the tricks of the trade early on.

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Jobs Give Teens Resources

Working hard at a job will help your teen form positive professional relationships that they can use to get strong letters of recommendation. Most students get letters of recommendation from teachers and faculty that they connected with at school, but having an employer write a letter really stands out. This can help in the college admissions process as well as in future job searches, which are sure to take your teen down the path to success. Good reference letters prove your teen can be successful in multiple aspects of their life, and shows the kind of work ethic they can bring to the college and beyond.

Jobs Teach Teens What they Want

Job experience also helps your teen understand what kinds of professions they might enjoy, and will give them an idea of what they need to do to reach their goals. If your teen doesn’t like flipping burgers, they might realize the importance of a college education. Then, they may set a goal to get into a certain school and study a certain subject so they can do something they’re passionate about. Goal setting is linked to success in teenagers, and jobs are a great introduction to this healthy habit. It’s normal for teens to be uncertain about what kind of job they might have in the future, but the more jobs they have, the closer they can get to figuring out what they might want to do later in their life.

Help Your Teen Get a Job!

Your teen will be much more prepared for a life of success after they’ve gained some work experience, so we recommend that you help them find a job a high school. They might not know how to make a résumé or what kinds of jobs might be a good fit, so it’s helpful when the parents lend a helping hand. After having a job, your teen will be much happier, more independent, and more successful in college and future pursuits.

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