People look for the ideal job. Many times, individuals are lucky to have found the perfect career path and follow it; other times, a person might not be sure what career path to follow and might bounce from job to job, trying to figure out the right career. Sometimes, it might be a matter of soul searching and passion for a subject, other times a matter of building skills. However, many times, personality is linked very closely to a perfect job or occupation. In some instances, a person might feel unease about a job because it might not match his/her personality well. A career personality test is a useful tool to find out your work style and type of work interaction according to your personality traits.
How does it Work?
There are several types of career tests. A career personality test will be a short questionnaire designed to highlight basic strengths and weaknesses on your personality that can be applied and related to the job or career sector. By knowing this information, a person can learn how to use this knowledge to advance or select the proper career path. For example, if a person does not feel at ease handling social and public situations, a career in social services might not fit this individual well. Many times, an individual may be oblivious to some career weaknesses, and a career personality test may be very insightful.
Pros of a Career Personality Test
A great benefit of these tests is that they are short, have a variety of questions, and there are different types. Other benefits include:
— The result will be guided by the answers that the individual taking the test provides.
— These tests are free and can be found online.
— They only take a few minutes of your time.
— They provide an analysis of the information you have provided by answering the questions.
— Many times, they provide matching careers where you can use the skills and strengths that have been highlighted.
— They measure several areas of your personality – feelings, perception…
Cons of Career Tests
— They might be too generalized.
— Multiple-choice questions force the individual to pick an answer, which might not be totally true.
— Other models use a degree of Agree to Disagree scale, according to the provided questions, which may or may not give room to other answers.
— An individual may rely on the results and not look at other possibilities.
— In a way, it labels the individual and his/her personality type.
— Depending on the type of test, individuals that take several tests might end up with confusing/conflicting results.
— Most people are a mixture of personality traits, and these tests might be limited and will not measure a complete array of traits, as some individual’s traits can evolve during his/her lifetime.
— Indeed, such tests fail in about 30 percent of the cases; these tests are not fool proof.
In sum, career personality tests can be useful as tools to get some insight and perspective. But like most things in life, they have their limitations as well.