Key skills you can obtain from a teaching career

By Thomas Watt
Monster Contributing Writer
Teaching’s a tough racket. Lot’s of burn out. Low pay, long hours, loads of under appreciation.
But what I learned from my five years as a teacher for high school and grade school cannot be adequately measured and has prepared me for the toughest challenges of my life.
Don’t belief the stigma
If you’re the person that always said “those that can’t do, teach” I’m here to tell you are 100%wrong, and that statement says more about what‘s amiss with our value system as a culture today than it does about the value of teaching.
In my tenure I have met some incredibly intelligent, ambitious, and courageous young men and women whose only sin was that they didn’t want to sacrifice their ethics by working for a fiscally aggressive big corporation, instead they dedicated their lives and considerable talent to helping others.
What’s more, is that I have realized that the skills you learn as a teacher are exactly the ones that employers are looking for in the vetting process for adding new members to their team.
Time Management
Teachers have to be experts at time management. From the get go that are inundated with extracurricular responsibilities on top of their primary pedagogical duties that would make even the most type ‘a’ person squirm. Teachers have to learn how to be self-starting and organized because they can fall behind quickly in such a tough environment. The ability to plan and manage scheduling is a crucial skill; one that can be honed has a teacher who more often then not has to juggle event planning, with school concerts, with teaching and parent teacher interviews all at the same time. As a teacher you learn the importance of meeting deadlines, because it’s not just about you, it’s about the students who are relaying on you.
Leadership
Teachers have to be leaders. You can sit in a class your whole life, but the second you stand up and walk to the front, turn around and become the center of authority, you will never know what it’s like. It’s exhausting. You have to be on all the time, because when you’re not, the whole class will fall apart. Teachers have to be excellent managers. They are the chief executive officer of a staff of 15 to 30 high maintenance ‘workers’, all with their special and particular needs. The practical learning of how to balance gravitas with a hand on approach in a leadership capacity that one receives as a teacher is truly second to none.
Public speaking
As a teacher you will learn the science and art of using your voice in public. That means being able to become an effective communicator. The ability to speak effectively in public and communicate your message in a timely and appealing manner is the golden seal for success in any field. Teaching can be analogous to acting. In order to get people to listen, they have to believe in you. I knew of one teacher, for instance, who happened to also be a Shakespearean actor, he used to have the most amazing blow ups in class, very effective stuff in classroom management and discipline, all made up of course , and executed to perfect effect.
People skills
As a teacher you will be the reason for many kids why they end up pursuing high studies or not, whether they choose to follow their passions and goals or not. Teachers learn early on the power of positive words and the intricacies of how to deal with human beings. They learn that some students need a firm push, while with others, a smile. Teachers also become excellent ‘readers’ of people, which is a key aspect in the success of not only the top performing salespeople all across the country but of every effective leader that has ever walked this earth.
Teaching is an amazing career one with many options and avenues open to the one who decides to pursue it. As the famous song goes: “If you make it here you can make it anywhere.” Well that might have been about the big apple, but for me it’s the teachers apple where job success really starts.