Joining us today, we have a guest post from Andre Castillo, founder of Career Mavin, a site that offers personal coaching and career training. He is sharing his tips on how to rally back from a less than stellar first semester.
Not getting the results you want first semester is a gut punch. But it can be the beginning of you doing great things—if you want it to be.
I know the feeling of that gut punch all too well.
For me, it happened out of high school on my first college applications. I thought I was the most amazing thing you’d ever seen. I had the GPA, the SAT, the awards. I got recruited by the Ivy Leagues. I got an interview from Harvard. I thought I was great. I had it all. Or so I thought.
I didn’t get in.
I was stunned. I was salty. But I’m forever grateful for that rejection. Because that lesson taught me everything I needed to become successful later.
And lower than expected grades can teach you the same things my rejection did—if you let it.
Not getting what I expected out of high school taught time to not assume I knew how to succeed. From then on, I became a voracious student—a mavin—for achieving my goals. I let others teach me, farbetter than my smart ass teenage self ever did. I even paid for others to teach me when I needed it. I tried new things and failed over and over and over again just so that I could learn how to do them the right way.
I didn’t care what anyone thought when I failed, even when I failed publicly—I was going to figure it out, darn it! I was never going to be surprised with poor results again.
And it worked. I went on to win dozens of international collegiate awards and scholarships. I got into Harvard—Harvard Law (this time, though, I rejected them)–and Johns Hopkins-SAIS, the best international affairs grad program in the world. I learned methods to get easier A’s in grad school, including law school, and landed a prestigious U.S. Presidential Management Fellowship. I led the world’s best career development program, my proudest achievement, which continues to impact the lives of millions. And I’ve used all of this to teach others how to do the same, and watched my network of friends and family achieve awesome things because of it.
My students have gone on to get awesome jobs and rapid promotions worth tens of thousands of dollars, and to lead large teams even more experienced than they are.
I did it, and they did it, simply by learning from those who knew. And by, most importantly, outright copying them.
Yeah we’d make some tweaks here or there. But copying from the best works—at least, when you’re just starting out, when you’re a professional in training. Just like a law student, who is an attorney in training.
The biggest mistake you made in law school was not that you got something wrong. No. It’s that you thought you had it right. A true professional does not assume she knows what’s right. A true professional ensures she knows what is the right way to do things, because she has done her homework. She has evaluated the alternatives. She has consulted the right people. And then she made a decision to follow the right techniques, and she actually followed them through. She bites the bullet early.
Mediocre results, on the other hand, means you assumed. You assumed you knew the way the game was played. You assumed you had it right. Professionals do not assume. They always, always verify.
And it’s not too late for you at all! Anyone can become a professional whenever she wants. Just seek out the help you need, and follow it to a “T.” Become a true professional now and it will pay off in spades later.
This is the way of the professional world. This is how it really works. As in the real world, a little upfront planning and self-investment is essential for success later.
Because your job is what you’re really after—not grades. So get a plan that makes your grades work for you.
About Andre:
My career is to help people solve this challenge. I design career training programs to get people, just like you, the results you want. And it works. I offer an unlimited personal career coaching program, and a specialized coaching program for law students who stumbled earlier and want to bounce back by putting you on hyper time-efficient study habits and successful networking strategies to land the perfect summer job–and a great, full-time career.
Read On:
Want to read more? Here you go:
The Crooked Path To and Through Law School
Are You Using Linkedin as Effectively as Possible?
Want to Be Content in Your Legal Career
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