New Promising Self-Employment Careers List by Holland Personality Type

Our new promising self-employment careers list on the Self-Employment Key website helps people match their Holland personality types to self-employed careers the U.S. Department of Labor forecasts to have a bright job outlook. If you're trying to decide whether self-employment is right for you, try our article, "Getting Started with Self-Employment Careers."

We also uploaded to thecareerkeyYouTube channel a short video overview about the list and the Self-Employment Key:

What made compiling this list a little more challenging is that the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) tracks "unincorporated" and "incorporated" self-employed people differently.  So BLS counts an incorporated, self-employed lawyer as a wage employee, treating him or her like other lawyers working for an employer. I addressed this issue by looking at the new 2012 Employment Projections, industry trends and Mr. Hipple's excellent Monthly Labor Review article cited below.

With the new 2012-13 BLS data, we also updated the matching occupations shown during the Career Key Self-Employment Test.  These occupations contain significant numbers of self-employed people.

The Career Key Self-Employment test, developed by Career Key author Dr. Lawrence K. Jones, NCC,  is unique in that it measures Holland's personality types, shows users occupations with a significant number of self-employed people in them, and measures two "Big 5" personality dimensions research shows are related to success as an entrepreneur. Click on "Research" to learn more about it.

Another great thing about the Self-Employment Key is that at no extra charge, test takers can use their RIASEC scores to explore more matching careers, green careers, college majors, and career clusters and career pathways at the Career Key website.

Sources: O*NET's My Next Move, the Occupational Outlook Handbook, and Steven F. Hipple's article, "Self-employment in the United States," Monthly Labor Review, September 2010.