Career Development:

1
Career Development

• Organizational
• and
• Individual
• Approaches
• HR 5110

Online Format
Professor James P. Pappas, Ph.D.
2
Career Coaching / Counseling Career
AssessmentUnit 4Module 2
3
ASSESSMENT INSTRUMENTS HELP IN

• vocational exploration
• vocational decision-making
• education planning
• training planning
• vocational adjustment

4
FORMAL ASSESSMENTS MAJOR KINDS

• Measures of Work Values
• Interest Inventories
• Personality Measures
• Multiple Aptitude Batteries
• Multiple Achievement Batteries
• Career Development/Maturity
• Combined Assessment Programs
• Instruments for Specific Populations

5
FOUR USES OF CAREER ASSESSMENT INSTRUMENTS

• 1. Prediction
• forecast odds, probabilities of success in
  educational, occupational or other types of
  career options
• how competitive they might be
• how high they can reach
• performance they are capable of achieving
• areas where they might experience ceilings on
  their performance

6
FOUR USES OF CAREER ASSESSMENT INSTRUMENTS
(contd)

• 2. Differentiation
• Self gt work content and environment
• Similarity between and individuals values,
  interests and preferences to those of persons in
  the occupational or educational environment being
  considered
• Help clients consider
• how compatible they might be to different work
  cultures
• occupational/educational groups they most
  resemble
• types of supervision and time structures they
  work within the most effectively

7
FOUR USES OF CAREER ASSESSMENT INSTRUMENTS
(contd)

• 3. Monitoring clients
• readiness to choose
• ability to choose
• level of career maturity
• status of decision-making orientation
• 4. Evaluation
• pre- and post-testing to
• determine changes in attitude and knowledge
• determine how well goals of career guidance have
  been achieved
• effectiveness of program content

8
COMMON MISTAKES IN CAREER ASSESSMENT

• Over-dependence on testing, neglecting informal
  assessment methods
• Not enough attention to interpretation
• Too much emphasis on measures of achievement and
  too little on measures of interest, aptitude,
  values, career maturity
• Inappropriate use of test results. Designed more
  for better self-understanding than for specific
  decisions
• Failure to administer properly and inform clients
  of the purpose of the tests

9
SPECIFIC POPULATIONS

• Types of Instruments
• Work samples
• Pictorial instruments
• Microcomputer applications
• Visualization
• Paper and pencil tests

10
MAJOR ISSUES TO CONSIDER

• Purpose
• Applicability
• Administration
• Scoring
• Bias
• Interpretation
• Reliability
• Validity
• Staffing Requirements
• Cost

11
PREPARATION FOR INTERPRETATION

• Understanding the results
• Review results for validity (evidence of random
  guessing, scoring errors, mismarking).
• Review results, asking What do these mean?
• Look for subtle and obvious agreements among
  various parts of the data.
• Try to anticipate clients likely questions,
  reactions or misinterpretations of results.
  Think through your responses.
• Plan ways to present flat or low scores.
• Take notes to use in the session

12
PREPARATION FOR INTERPRETATION (contd)

• Are results consistent with your available
  knowledge of the client? Are they in agreement
  with or do they conflict with other data?
• Work history
• family situation
• academic history/education
• other test scores
• career aspirations
• career maturity
• physical limitations
• financial resources

13
POSITIVE UNCERTAINTY

• Be focused and flexible about what you want
• Be aware and wary about what you know
• Be objective and optimistic about what you
  believe
• Be practical and magical about what you do