Career counselling: questions and answers

Q1: Dear sir, I am a professional accountant in a Faisalabad-based company for last nine years. It’s a multinational company. Now I want to study Law/ LLB. After this degree I wish to start practice of law. Your advice will help me in making decision. (Naqi Abbas- Gujrat)

Ans: Dear Mr Abbas, keeping in view your previous academic qualification and experience, I would advise you should not do a general law. Being an accountant by profession and experience this would be my first advice to you.

However, if you are still interested in doing law then you should consider doing Corporate Law or Tax Law and for this you can certainly look through the internet that who offers Corporate Law.

Q2: Dear Sir, I got 77% marks in intermediate pre-medical after an improvement of one year. I really wish to get in medical college but unfortunately due to high merit I am not able to make it. I have two career options in front of me now which best suite me, i-e; BS Psychology or DPT. Sir, I’m very much confused as to which field should I opt. Can you please suggest if any of these career options have scope in Pakistan? (Jessica Samuel- Nankana Sahab)

Ans: Dear Miss Jessica, if you wish to become a medical science student without doing a professional degree such as MBBS, then it’s a wise decision. I will; therefore, advise you to choose a four-year honors degree in Microbiology or Biochemistry following which you will have many options to work in hospitals alongside doctors as health specialist and pathologists who are in high demand.

Q3: Dear Mr Abidi, I read your column recently and thought to contact and get some guidance regarding my daughter. She is studying Bachelors, and her degree is a four-year honors in Microbiology. Please advise what are the future prospects/scopes of this field? (Zaair Shaukat, Rawalpindi)

Ans: Dear Zaair, I can tell you this is a very innovative and emerging subject area. Therefore, once she completes her bachelor's degree, I would recommend her to consider doing Masters in Genetics or DNA Analysis which comes under Genomatics. This will enable her to work on research of different viruses alongside those who are working in developing new drugs for viruses and have a huge demand.

Q4: Sir, I want to become a professional Engineer but I’m getting confused as which engineering field I should choose. Therefore, I need your kind help if you can please guide me if I should apply for Electrical Engineering or Mechanical Engineering? Which field has better scope? (Gulbaz Sabz Khan- Peshawar)

Ans: Dear Mr Sabz Khan, my advice to you is that you should do Mechatronics. I’m suggesting you this subject as it combines Electrical and Mechanical Engineering. It gives you an edge over a single subject specialisation. I advise you search the subject on Internet for the further details.

(Syed Azhar Husnain Abidi is a renowned educationist in Pakistan, with more than 20 years of experience as provider of education counselling services. He has represented Pakistan in over 100 national and international seminars, conferences and fora. He is a recipient of the most coveted civil award Tamgha-e-Imtiaz).