What’s in My Garage: Getting My Career Portfolio Up To Date

Last Sunday I had my last Career Development Facilitator class where we each presented a project and talked about our career portfolios. First, about my project...

I created a sample career development program for a community college that helps students choose a major or program offered by the college that matches their interests, using The Career Key. Essentially, a customized list of programs. So when you take The Career Key test and get your results, you could then see your own college’s programs organized by Holland type and Career Key work group, the same way we organize careers.  See an example for the Artistic personality type from The Education Key e-Book.

The project was fun (believe it or not) but took some time so I haven’t been able to blog or tweet much recently.

Then my class talked about Career Portfolios, a way of organizing your career planning information like self-assessment results, resumes, letters of recommendation, etc. Activities you complete from “Learn More About Yourself” would go in it.

What I found, in preparing for my class, is that my career portfolio didn’t really exist, much less in a single place.  I have bits and pieces of my career self all over the place.  Here are some random things I collected from my home office and the garage:

• Strong Interest Inventory and MBTI results from 1989 (wow, who knew I carried those out here to the West Coast from NC where I grew up?)
• My Career Key assessment results
• My college transcript (a little scary to see how little I remember about my coursework)
• Writing samples from my first year of law school
• Research memos I wrote in my first legal job
• Copy of articles I wrote for local legal publications
• My resume and cover letters for my last two jobs 
• Photographs from my last job at a law enforcement agency (you've got to love uniforms!)
• Certificates of completion for training courses

The list goes on. And you likely have similar random things lying around that seen alone, may not mean much. But when you put these things together, you see valuable insights into your career planning process:

• patterns about yourself,
• things that you enjoyed (or not so much),
• accomplishments you’d forgotten,
• “good experiences” - things you’ve done that you enjoyed and are proud of...

Gathering scraps of paper about my life was very helpful for self-exploration.  A reminder of the things I’m passionate about, the things that have changed about me, and about new things I want to do.

What’s in your garage?

Best Careers for Women Online Resources: Happy Woman’s Day!

In honor of Woman’s Day, I’ve put together a few “Best Careers for Women” resources you may want to visit on your career choice journey.  As you work through your career options, it helps to think of your current and future work-life balance needs.  Some of these resources will help you think about them.

Being a mom to a toddler, my view of what “work-life balance” means and its importance are a little different from when I first hit the grownup job market in 1996. And balance doesn’t only relate to motherhood - more and more women are taking care of aging parents. And if you have none of these responsibilities, maybe you'd just like to have a well-rounded life!

The reality is that most women continue to shoulder the larger burden of family care - whether "family" means a partner, a child, or a parent.  So your job will need to accomodate your needs as they change. (If you have a SuperNanny and/or Merry Maid for a spouse or partner, keep your good fortune to yourself!)

When I see lists of best paying jobs for women I cringe a little.  If it was all about the money, wouldn’t career choice be simpler?  But it’s not. Salary does matter but there are many other factors (like your personality) to take into account. (And the issue of salary equality with men is a whole other discussion).

What’s important to you? What life stage are you in? Find out by doing the activities recommended in “Learn More About Yourself.”

And in the meantime, I hope you’ll find these resources generate some ideas as you work through the career choice or change process:

The Self-Employment Key’s article “Work-Life Balance: Decision-Making for Women”

Best-Paying Jobs The Women Aren’t In (Forbes, 2/17/2010)
with an interesting response by blogger Lylah Alphonse (The 36-hour day) with some valid counterpoints.

More Mag’s “10 Best Jobs for Over-Forty Women”
You could argue this is not a list just for 40&overs...

U.S. Department of Labor’s Women’s Bureau

Working Mother Magazine’s Work-Life Balance section
And many other articles on the site with “best companies” lists...

Role Model Project for Girls

Khake.com’s “Girl Specific” career exploration guides


I am fortunate to have a flexible schedule so I can spend more time with my son. And I remember that one of the reasons I chose my first career, law, was because of the flexibility in hours and cases a solo practice would offer me. This turned out to be accurate and a good plan; I used my self-employed time to travel and explore my interests. What career can you carve out for yourself that fits your life?

Green Jobs that Match Your Personality: New Unique & Free Article

If you'd like to see Green Jobs organized by Holland personality type and Career Key's unique, helpful work groups, please see our new, free article on matching your personality to green jobs and careers.  It includes the "green economy" jobs added to the U.S. Department of Labor's O*NET database in the fall of 2009.

Our new article is the only place online you can find green jobs organized by personality type, using the popular, respected Holland Theory of Career Choice. It's also the only green jobs resource based on a scientifically valid measure of Holland's 6 personality types, The Career Key.

Please feel free to link to this new article by following our linking policy.

Reminder: 10% of website sales (of our valid tests and e-Books) go to charities like The Nature Conservancy, the World Wildlife Fund, and UNICEF.

Please email me your feedback on the new article or post a comment here. Thank you!

5 Ways to Channel Your Inner Career Choice Optimist - Being Realistic but Optimistic

If you’re in the process of choosing a career and looking at career options, you’re surrounded by enough bad news to make you a “paralytic decision-maker.” Like discouraging findings from the new report, “The Labor Market, Then and Now” from the John J. Heldrich Center on Workforce Development:

• U.S. Government employment projections have historically been proven wrong. 
• Job satisfaction is at its lowest level since the data was first tracked. 
• Baby boomers are not retiring like they were supposed to so there are fewer jobs than expected. 
• In the last decade, the time it takes to find a job has gone from 3 to 6 months (there go your savings!).

and the list goes on....

Not to mention all the doom and gloom predictions about the U.S. “empire” going down the tubes due to “do-nothing” politics and overwhelming deficits. It’s been so bad I substituted watching Stephen Colbert’s Winter Olympics for online news this week.
 
So instead of putting on Leonard Cohen CDs and opening a bottle of strong medicine, what’s the forward-looking, hard-working career decision-maker to do with all this gloomy outlook? I call it channeling your inner optimist - being realistic but optimistic. Here are 5 ways to do that:

1. Make sure you have realistic expectations of the career choice process.  No matter how much research you do, how many assessments you take, what informational interviews you conduct - your choice is a calculated risk.  That’s why important decisions are hard - you can never be 100% sure your choice will result in success. Prepare to be adaptable and surprised. 
2. Explore all aspects of the career decision process in a methodical way - confronting your fears and negative consequences of your choice with a plan to respond to them. Use our 4 step “High Quality Decisions” article and the downloadable “decision balance sheet” to get started.  Write down your thoughts - it's called bibliotherapy and writing therapy - it works and it's free!
   
3. Rely on the best resources for career information you can, knowing their weaknesses and strengths.  Although the government job outlook data can be proven incorrect (maybe God should be hired as a consultant to predict job growth), it has also been proven correct for many occupations. The government uses data from individual states and provinces, relying on labor economic experts to compile it but it often lags a few years behind.  As long as you treat it as only one piece of the puzzle, government information can be useful. 
4. Rely on scientifically valid self-assessments - ones that are proven to measure what they say they measure. Otherwise you may make a decision you regret.  The Career Key is not the only valid test; we recommend you take other tests and assessments in addition to The Career Key. Just be careful and discriminating about tests on the Internet because very few have scientific validity. If you are a college graduate, make sure you take advantage of your school’s career center that may offer valid tests for free or a nominal fee. 
5. Think “right” thoughts. Your thoughts help determine your behavior and actions so treat your career choice and career development with a positive outlook. If you believe you will fail, you will. Cognitive psychology research has shown this to be true.  Books from positive psychology thought leaders like Dr. Martin Seligman and cognitive psychology experts like Dr. David Burns can help. Make sure to surround yourself with positive people to support your efforts.

New Study: Matching Your Holland Personality with Your Career Boosts Earnings

Matching your Holland interests or personality to your career choice or "job congruence" leads to higher earnings, according to a new research study involving alumni from 300 U.S. colleges and universities. The study appears in the journal Labour Economics and authors are from the University of Iowa, University of Massachusetts - Dartmouth, and ACT, Inc., respectively. (Citation below)

In short:

• choosing a career that is consistent with or matches your Holland interests (RIASEC types) results in higher earnings;
• Job congruence affects earnings almost to the same order of magnitude as additional years of schooling.

To take advantage of these findings and all the research supporting Holland's Theory of Career Choice in career and education decision-making, it is very important that you use a scientifically valid measure of Holland's personality types. You need to be confident that the test has been proven to accurately measure what it says it measures.

On the Career Key website, we have tips on how to tell whether or not a test is "scientifically valid", including a download of a recent National Career Development Association Career Developments magazine article about evaluating and choosing a career test written by Career Key author Dr. Lawrence K. Jones.

Study Citation:
Neumann, G., Olitsky, N., Robbins, S. (2009) Job congruence, academic achievement, and earnings. Labour Economics, 16, 503-509.

Who Cares What a College Degree is Really Worth? It's Career Planning that Matters.

While it's helpful that this WSJ article "What's a Degree Really Worth" draws attention to some overblown numbers for the value of college degree and the risks of getting a degree, I think a main point is missed.  Instead of focusing on the average lifetime earnings of a college grad - not a terribly useful or accurate statistic for people choosing a career or educational program, focus instead on career direction and planning. Our "Getting Started" article gives the 3 steps for that process based on the best science and practices of professional career counseling.

The point is not whether a college degree is worth $450K or $800K in lifetime earnings, but how a student plans to translate their degree or program (training, 2 year, 4 year) into a career path.  Look at the article's example of a UC-Berkeley grad earning a pittance (for San Francisco) as a small paper reporter with over $60,000 in student debt.  It is not a mystery or a surprise to any writers out there that journalism is not a lucrative profession, even in the best of times.

So to imply that it was too risky or wasn't financially worth it to get a B.A. to get that reporting job doesn't make sense. Imagine applying for any decent paying reporter job without a college degree. Pretty difficult.  When you choose a career path that has a relatively low salary and uncertain job prospects, you need to be prepared for a bumpy ride. Maybe you have to work while you go to school to avoid higher debt, or go to a cheaper school. These are compromises that you may need to make.

I am sympathetic, though.  I can relate to the graduate's comment "it [her financial situation] was harder than I think I expected it to be" because that's what happened to me after graduating law school in '96 in a recession. Despite the best laid plans, you can never be certain how things will turn out.

Some form of training or college is required for any living wage job (unless you believe in the Bill Gates syndrome - good luck to you!) It's a matter of making choices and good decisions - and being prepared for economic change. 

Our high-quality decision-making article can really help you sort through those choices and prepare yourself for any negative consequences (like living on a shoestring for 10 years) in pursuing your passion.

Back from a Successful Cannexus Conference

After a fantastic CANNEXUS conference last week in Ottawa, Canada (photo left), I am finally getting back online. Because I live in Seattle, the grey weather did not scare me. I gave 2 presentations:

• "Choosing a Post-Secondary Program: Increasing the Odds of Success" focusing on research studies demonstrating higher grades and in some cases, retention, for students choosing a major that matches their Holland interests, and 
• A demonstration of The Career Key Canada website, the new Education Key e-Book, and our scientifically valid tests, The Career Key and the Career Decision Profile.

I love Canada. Every time I go there the people are friendly, interesting to talk to and open-minded about new resources.  Yes, Comedy Central's South Park and American pundits sometimes make fun of how "nice" Canadians are. But trust me, you'd rather spend 3 twelve hour days at a conference with Social personality types from Canada than anywhere else in the world (no offense to my home country).

I know Canadians have the usual crime, unemployment, and problems with their politicians - but seeing Ottawa workers ice skate to work on the Rideau Canal (built in the early 1800s as a part of a defense against the new USA) has a way of lending Canada a cold but fun, Zen-like quality - far away from reality.  A Zamboni on a frozen city canal - how cool is that?  Chicago, take notes....

All right, enough reminiscing.  I plan on posting this week about:

• the impact of marriage and significant others on career choices - in honor of Valentine's Day, and 
• ingredients for college and university success using Holland Theory of Career Choice, from my conference presentation last week.

Although I enjoyed my trip, I am glad to be back.