Student Readiness for Conservation Careers: Identifying critical skills needed for success in the 21st century natural resource conservation workforce

Abstract

There is a growing variety of research, management and innovation opportunities in conservation fields. Knowing what organizations will expect in terms of professional capabilities is important for directing the continued education, growth, and development of young adults and early career professionals. Unfortunately, these are not well known. Most existing inventories were developed through theoretical or retrospective analyses of pre-existing jobs and position descriptions. To guide preparation of successful next generation of professionals, we endeavored to pivot this perspective 180 degrees to explore how current new employee performance and future trends in conservation can inform a revised set of critical professional skills and abilities. An interdisciplinary research team synthesized a list of skills and abilities from existing research. We interviewed a purposeful sample of nine conservation professionals, representing a range of agencies, disciplines, and organization types about skills and mindsets that contributed to her/his success, experiences with new employee success, future trends in conservation work. From these interviews, we synthesized a group of four trends likely to influence next generation conservation career mindsets and skills, as well as a framework of eight critical skills and mindsets for early career development of 21st century conservation professionals.