il(Legal) Barrier to Career Well Being Webinar May 24

Do your clients have legal concerns preventing them from achieving career well-being? Learn ways to help them by joining me for a webinar I’m giving next Thursday May 24, 12 Noon Eastern at CEUOneStop. Learn more.

Hope to see you there!

Career Assessment Matches Students to a College's Majors with New Career Key for Higher Education Tool

Holland career assessment leader Career Key announces a new "My College's Majors" tool that enables admissions, first year experience (FYE) and student success programs to match students to the programs and majors their school offers.

Career Key Discovery for Higher Education, "Leveling Up," includes this new tool. My College's Majors encourages greater student engagement and leads to more long-term benefits because students choose from and make their personality-major match to the most relevant education options to them - the ones offered by their institution.

Studies show students who make this close Holland personality-major match are more likely to:

1. Get higher grades,
2. Stick with their major, and
3. Graduate on time.

More details about personality-major match research and how students can benefit are available on the Career Key website and in two popular, free eBooks:

• Match Your Personality to College Majors: what does the research say? (For students and parents)
• Personality Major Match and Student Success: Professionals' Guide (For counselors and educators)

Strengthening Career Well-Being: New tips and eBook from Career Key

Interested in strengthening your career well-being? Learn how with the new “Guide to Strengthening Career Well-Being”, a free downloadable eBook from Career Key. 

Career well-being: what is it and how do I strengthen it? (PDF)

In it, Career Key career assessment author Dr. Lawrence K. Jones and Juliet Wehr Jones, GCDF describe:

• What career well being is, and
• How it impacts your overall well-being, including your health and relationships.

Then they recommend practical ways to strengthen your career well-being to improve your overall health and happiness. 

Both the website article and eBook link to additional resources and recommended self-help activities on the Career Key website.

More resources for professionals:

•   “Strengthening Career Well-Being and Well-Being:A Primer for Professionals” is a special eBook version for counselors, practitioners and professionals with additional references and citations.
• Using Holland's Theory of Career Choice to strengthen career well-being

 

Increase Your Job Security: Become a Free Agent

To increase your job security and career well-being, adopt a free agent outlook on work. This means spending time planning ahead, building marketable skills, and prioritizing your health and family. Doing so will empower you in the job market. 

Americans are vulnerable to forced career and job changes – this is the nature of our economy and our physical and mental frailty as human beings. I know this personally and from years practicing labor and employment law and volunteering at my neighborhood legal clinic. Statistics also bear this out.

Today the number of long term unemployed people (out of work over 6 months) remains historically high, at nearly 30% of the total unemployed. More than 22% of the unemployed have been out of work for over a year. (BLS, 2015)

Americans are also financially vulnerable. A recent Gallup poll found that half of us are unprepared for sudden financial need, like a major purchase, medical event, or job loss.

Lastly, employers are outsourcing the jobs we thought were safe from export. In just one example, technology workers at Disney were laid off after training foreign "guest" workers as replacements. A recent New York Times article explains this is not an isolated instance.

 

People’s stories of feeling trapped in and out of jobs haunt me. They feel powerless and acted upon by employers, mostly by legal means, and a rapidly changing job market. And they are educated people, like technology workers, business owners, teachers, police officers, and financial professionals. Any of us gainfully employed could be one of them.

But we can do things now to make ourselves less vulnerable. Instead of feeling trapped or ill-prepared for the next layoff, we can plan ahead for our next job or career change.

Six Principles of the Free Agent Outlook on Work

Adopting this outlook will help, as will saving more money this year for your emergency fund.  Having Plan B and a safety net go a long way toward increasing your job security.

One way I follow this advice is by keeping my lawyer “bar card” active and volunteering to keep my legal skills strong even though I have no plans to return to my own law practice. I still get to do what enjoyed most as a lawyer without the stress or overhead hassle.

We don’t need to be as vulnerable and many of us have the power to do something about it. Don’t let day to day work distract you from what matters most and your job security.

I also published a slightly different version of this post on LinkedIn.

Catch Up with Recent Career Key Newsletters

Happy New Year! If you haven't signed up for our newsletter or missed our most recent ones, feel free to catch up with these links.

• Your Students' Priorities and Holland, September
• Avoid College Ranking and Scorecard Tricks, October/November
• Happy Holidays and Special Offer, December

I try to put career development research, humor, Career Key news, cool links and downloads in one short package!

If you like what you read, sign up here.

New College and Career Readiness Infographic from Career Key

Career Key's new college and career readiness infographic shows the American School Counselor Association's (ASCA) new ASCA Mindsets and Behaviors for Student Success covered when students take the Career Key's career interest inventory. Counselors can use the infographic to easily visualize how their use of Career Key aligns with these research-based standards.

The assessment, based on Holland's Theory of Career Choice, helps middle and high school students make sense of career choices and choosing classes by identifying careers that match their personality and interests.  Research shows this match leads to higher levels of engagement, satisfaction and success.

New Career Key Test and Activity Booklet Published

We just reprinted and updated the Career Key Test and Activity Booklet, now available for sale on Amazon. (Free shipping!) They cost about $2 apiece and are sold in sets of 35 booklets.

These booklets are perfect for when you need an easy, printed activity that covers the career essentials for students and adults in classes and workshops...

The 20 page, color booklet includes the self-scoring Career Key test, a description of Holland's Theory of Career Choice including the hexagon, and recommended activities with worksheets to further engage in the career exploration process, like:

• Learning more about occupations
• Learning more about yourself
• Creating a career portfolio, and
• How to make a good decision.