My Experience with NotebookLM: How Google's AI Helped Me Explore Career Options

In today’s fast-paced world, finding career guidance can feel overwhelming. That's exactly what led me to try Google’s AI-powered tool, NotebookLM. I got a newsletter this morning that highlighted getting advice by querying curated collections of information with featured notebooks in NotebookLM

I chose How To Build A Life, from The Atlantic notebook and asked for help deciding what career to choose at this point in my life (for which I provided more detail that I am sharing here). I was impressed with the answers that I got back under categories including, 'Focus on the "Who" and the "Why" of Work,' 'Cultivate Self-Knowledge and Flexibility,' and 'Embrace Transitions as Opportunities.'

While these all seem like obvious areas to focus on, it was good to get it all in a digestible way in one place. A few things that resonated with me were that I should not reduce myself to one characteristic or trait, and that I should be flexible on the exact job and search for a one where the values and culture align with my own.

I'm still experimenting with it but I do feel that the hour I've invested so far has helped me reframe how I will approach my career journey.