Often people ask me, “What could I possibly learn about myself from a career test that I don’t already know?” I would like to offer a bit about assessments in general and how we use them at EPIC Career to put people on a path to career success.
Assessments We Use
MBTI: You Against the World
We offer two assessments in our consulting package. Results from the first, the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI), will help you understand yourself relative to others, such as close family members, friends, or enemies. You might be caught off guard by that last one, but it is important to understand where you stack up relative to others including those with whom you do not have much in common. Have you ever wondered how unusual a particular interest or personality trait of yours is relative to others? The MBTI will help you understand this. This assessment will help you understand your unique personality, how common it is in society, and how you can make adaptations in your life to better communicate and relate to others in every aspect of your life, including your work life.
SII: Careers in Depth
The second assessment, the Strong Interest Inventory (SII), is specifically designed to describe you relative to different career field categories (e.g., enterprising, entrepreneurial activities, dealing directly with people and their needs, dealing directly with data often independently), work settings (e.g., outdoors, office settings, large group settings), leadership style (e.g., more reflective lead by example, take charge with clear directives meeting challenges head on, not very interested in leadership) and other career-related areas. The amazing part of career assessments is the fact that they so clearly relate you to various specific career fields. Have you ever wished that you could figure out how to make the interests that you most love pursuing fit into a career wherein you could make some money? Well, that is exactly what career assessments do.
Assessment Critique
Why These Assessments?
People often tell me that they have taken a free career assessment online, but that they did not like the results or the results did not seem to relate to them. As with anything in life, there are good and bad assessments. By this I mean that there are rigorously researched, highly reliable and valid assessments, but there are also others that are poorly researched and that yield not so reliable or valid results. We use the MBTI and the SII because they are some of the longest used, most highly respected career assessments available. Some have called them the “gold standard” of career assessments. They have both been researched in great depth and are used widely throughout the world.
How Are Results Generated?
Basically, the publisher of the assessments researches large groups of people who are different in many ways (e.g., age, gender, income level, educational attainment). Information is gained about the career interests of these individuals. Their interests are ranked highest to lowest. Your responses to the assessments are related to their responses to create a ranked list of your professional interests. This is how the results are generated for you. This kind of research has been carried out so many times with such wide ranges of groups that they yield what are generally considered to be solid, reliable data with which you can feel comfortable making significant career decisions.
What Makes a Good Assessment?
There are many other assessments about which similar research has been completed. Unfortunately, to yield solid reliable data, you must conduct this same kind of research repeatedly with wide ranges of people. This is not only expensive, but it takes a lot of time. The MBTI and the SII are among the oldest career tests. As a result, they are among the most researched and therefore most reliable and valid career assessments available.
So I’ve Got the Data – Now What?
In addition to academically studying career assessment in depth, Dr. Rodriguez completed extensive training about the inner workings of colleges and universities of different kinds. In his graduate level training, he took courses with multiple former senior higher education leaders to build a broad view of how these institutions function. He then served himself as a university instructor and senior leader at various institutions. Dr. Rodriguez will bring this background to the consulting meeting to help you not only understand your assessment results, but also make a workable plan for pursuing college courses, if necessary. The assessment results will describe college majors that would prepare you for the highest ranked career fields listed in your assessment results. Dr. Rodriguez will help you decide on a college/university that offers those programs. He will then explain how these institutions are different from one another, and what personnel at the institution to contact and what questions to ask of them.
From this discussion, you will be entirely informed about what career fields are most likely to offer you career satisfaction for the rest of your life. You will also have a clear understanding of how to pursue any of those career fields and you will have created a clear path to move you into any one of them. When I work with individuals with work experience, they routinely tell me that they wish they had had this information before they had… Usually the next part of their response includes a long story of a job that they did not like or in which they felt trapped with no way out. I hope for you is that, as much as possible, you will not be in this situation. At EPIC Career we are here to help. When you are ready to create your path to a lifetime of career satisfaction, just let us know.
Assessments We Use
MBTI: You Against the World
We offer two assessments in our consulting package. Results from the first, the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI), will help you understand yourself relative to others, such as close family members, friends, or enemies. You might be caught off guard by that last one, but it is important to understand where you stack up relative to others including those with whom you do not have much in common. Have you ever wondered how unusual a particular interest or personality trait of yours is relative to others? The MBTI will help you understand this. This assessment will help you understand your unique personality, how common it is in society, and how you can make adaptations in your life to better communicate and relate to others in every aspect of your life, including your work life.
SII: Careers in Depth
The second assessment, the Strong Interest Inventory (SII), is specifically designed to describe you relative to different career field categories (e.g., enterprising, entrepreneurial activities, dealing directly with people and their needs, dealing directly with data often independently), work settings (e.g., outdoors, office settings, large group settings), leadership style (e.g., more reflective lead by example, take charge with clear directives meeting challenges head on, not very interested in leadership) and other career-related areas. The amazing part of career assessments is the fact that they so clearly relate you to various specific career fields. Have you ever wished that you could figure out how to make the interests that you most love pursuing fit into a career wherein you could make some money? Well, that is exactly what career assessments do.
Assessment Critique
Why These Assessments?
People often tell me that they have taken a free career assessment online, but that they did not like the results or the results did not seem to relate to them. As with anything in life, there are good and bad assessments. By this I mean that there are rigorously researched, highly reliable and valid assessments, but there are also others that are poorly researched and that yield not so reliable or valid results. We use the MBTI and the SII because they are some of the longest used, most highly respected career assessments available. Some have called them the “gold standard” of career assessments. They have both been researched in great depth and are used widely throughout the world.
How Are Results Generated?
Basically, the publisher of the assessments researches large groups of people who are different in many ways (e.g., age, gender, income level, educational attainment). Information is gained about the career interests of these individuals. Their interests are ranked highest to lowest. Your responses to the assessments are related to their responses to create a ranked list of your professional interests. This is how the results are generated for you. This kind of research has been carried out so many times with such wide ranges of groups that they yield what are generally considered to be solid, reliable data with which you can feel comfortable making significant career decisions.
What Makes a Good Assessment?
There are many other assessments about which similar research has been completed. Unfortunately, to yield solid reliable data, you must conduct this same kind of research repeatedly with wide ranges of people. This is not only expensive, but it takes a lot of time. The MBTI and the SII are among the oldest career tests. As a result, they are among the most researched and therefore most reliable and valid career assessments available.
So I’ve Got the Data – Now What?
In addition to academically studying career assessment in depth, Dr. Rodriguez completed extensive training about the inner workings of colleges and universities of different kinds. In his graduate level training, he took courses with multiple former senior higher education leaders to build a broad view of how these institutions function. He then served himself as a university instructor and senior leader at various institutions. Dr. Rodriguez will bring this background to the consulting meeting to help you not only understand your assessment results, but also make a workable plan for pursuing college courses, if necessary. The assessment results will describe college majors that would prepare you for the highest ranked career fields listed in your assessment results. Dr. Rodriguez will help you decide on a college/university that offers those programs. He will then explain how these institutions are different from one another, and what personnel at the institution to contact and what questions to ask of them.
From this discussion, you will be entirely informed about what career fields are most likely to offer you career satisfaction for the rest of your life. You will also have a clear understanding of how to pursue any of those career fields and you will have created a clear path to move you into any one of them. When I work with individuals with work experience, they routinely tell me that they wish they had had this information before they had… Usually the next part of their response includes a long story of a job that they did not like or in which they felt trapped with no way out. I hope for you is that, as much as possible, you will not be in this situation. At EPIC Career we are here to help. When you are ready to create your path to a lifetime of career satisfaction, just let us know.
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