Career Choices and Ambitions

Make sure you know the Spanish words for a range of jobs and professions such as ‘teacher’ (profesor/profesora), ‘accountant’ (contador/contadora), ‘engineer’ (ingeniero/ingeniera) and so on.
Be able to discuss your job aspirations and ambitions in Spanish. Use phrases such as ‘I would like to be…’ (Me gustaría ser…) or ‘In the future, I want to become…’ (En el futuro, quiero ser…).
Familiarise yourself with the Spanish vocabulary for talking about job responsibilities and routines such as ‘organising’ (organizando), ‘planning’ (planificando) and ‘communicating’ (comunicando).
Be ready to talk about the qualities needed for different professions. Make a list of useful adjectives such as ‘responsible’ (responsable), ‘creative’ (creativo/creativa) and ‘efficient’ (eficiente).
Learn how to talk about academic and vocational pathways in Spanish. Use phrases like ‘I plan to attend university’ (Planeo ir a la universidad) or ‘I would like to start an apprenticeship’ (Me gustaría comenzar un aprendizaje).
Understand how to discuss the positives and negatives of different career choices in Spanish. Use phrases such as ‘The advantages are…’ (Las ventajas son…) or ‘The main disadvantage is…’ (La principal desventaja es…).
Practice discussing career ambitions using a range of grammatical structures, including subjunctive, future tense and conditional tense.
Learn how to use reflexive verbs and daily routine verbs in Spanish to talk about a day at work. For example, ‘I get up at 6am to go to work’ (Me levanto a las 6 de la mañana para ir al trabajo).
Be ready to use complex constructions in Spanish to describe career choices and ambitions, such as ‘Despite finding it challenging, I would like to become a doctor’ (A pesar de que lo encuentro desafiante, me gustaría ser médico).
Prepare to discuss the value of job satisfaction and work-life balance in Spanish using phrases like ‘It is important to enjoy one’s work’ (Es importante disfrutar de su trabajo) and ‘It is essential to have a balance between work and personal life’ (Es esencial tener un equilibrio entre el trabajo y la vida personal).