Career Assessment Paper
RUNNING HEAD: Analysis of Career Assessment Instrument
Analysis of a Career Assessment Instrument
August 20, 2014
Abstract
Career Assessment Instruments
2
Career assessment is important for every individual so as to understand their expectations. There are different tools which are used in assessing individuals’ career expectations. These tools can be used to help individuals to come up with conclusions in what they want to do with their lives.
However, this should be done with a lot of care to achieve good results. Career assessment instruments are used to measure psychological-personal characteristics which include amplitude, interests, skills and personality type. In dealing with these tools, one has to understand their
limitations …show more content…
in order to come up with good results.
Career assessment instrument
Assessment instrument is a method used to collect information concerning learner’s performance and understanding about a certain topic (King, n.d). For individuals to understand how a variety of personal attributes impact their potential success and satisfaction with different career options and work environments, they require an instrument to assist them. This instrument is called the career assessment instrument. There are several types of career assessment tools designed to help individuals assess themselves. These tools include the work interest quiz, the
Keirsey Temperament sorter, Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, strong interest inventory, career key, focus career and Educational planning Solutions, the Campbell Interest and skill survey among others (C.L.C.A., n.d).
In this paper, the Campbell Interest and Skill Survey instrument will be discussed. Campbell Interest and Skill Survey
Career Assessment Instruments
3
The Campbell Interest and skills survey is a 320- item instrument. It is used to assess vocational interests and self-estimates of skills paralleling interests measured by the inventory
(Brown & Lent, 2012). By using this instrument, the individuals self-reported efforts are compared with various occupations. It uses a seven orientation scale to range the students. These orientation skills are: (a) influencing, (b) organizing, (c) helping, (d) creating, (e) analyzing, (f) producing and (g) adventuring (St. Edward’s University, 2014). Two scores are calculated for each scale: interest which finds how much one likes the specified activities and skills which measures how confident one feels about performing these activities. Then the instrument reports four patterns of combinations of interest and skill scores. These patterns are:
1. Pursue: in this report, both the interest and skills scores are high.
2. Develop: this report shows high interest score but low skills score. It recommends further education, training or experience for better performance and …show more content…
greater confidence. 3. Explore: depicts high skills score but lower interest score. Recommends further exploration to find other interesting areas.
4. Avoid: here, the individual skills and interest scores are low (St. Edward’s
University, 2014).
The reason for the choice of this instrument lies in its ability to make individuals understand their personal attributes including interests, values, preferences, motivations, aptitudes and skills. There are several benefits associated with the use of this tool. The individuals are assisted by the interest scales and the parallel skills scales to gain more thorough understanding of suitable career options. The terms used by this survey are contemporary and
Career Assessment Instruments
4
easily understood. There is the benefit to the individuals in that there is a reflection of respect by the test items to individuals of different gender, race, religion, and national origin. The use of combined gender scales allows for the broadest interpretation of survey results. This tool ensures that assessments can be emailed to clients for them to complete the assessments at their own location by the use of remote on screen administration capacity. This planner leads individuals through thoughtful analysis of results and it also helps them to translate their thoughts into specific actions. Using this tool helps the individual in exploring 299 additional occupations and
159 fields of study and helps them in analyzing their work and education while relating to their values and priorities. Individuals through the use of this tool can be able to identify motivators and obstacles regarding the individual career goals (Campbell, 2003; Fischman, 2004).
The reliability and validity test were investigated over 90 day period. The median testretest reliability coefficients were found to be 0.87, 0.83 and 0.87 for orientation, basic and occupation interest respectively. The skills scales are however shorter and lower coefficients of
0.81, 0.79 and 0.79 were obtained (Campbell, n.d).
To help the client in interpreting the results, it is important to verify the results with other information. In verifying the results, the client needs to be asked if the results are consistent with information like grades, self-perceptions, work performance and other evaluations. By verifying this, you accomplish two goals. First, by providing a method of identifying any problems that may have happened during the testing, and secondly, more client problems are brought in an interpretative process. This verification process assists in that it provides a more holistic view of the client’s abilities and also gives information on other parts of the client’s life (Whinston,
2012).
Career Assessment Instruments
5
When choosing a culturally sensitive assessment tool, the client’s environment should be considered. Influence of the relational processes within the client’s ecological context could impact on their functioning. Family, school environment, peers, neighbourhood, community are some of the ecological relational processes. Factors such as poverty, discrimination and limited opportunities could affect the client. In this context, a multidimensional assessment can assist in choosing the most appropriate multi-modal and multi contextual interventions (Roberts &
Watkins, 2009).
Also, the beliefs of the client need to be known. This is because some clients hold beliefs that make them view some careers as inferior or for certain gender. To successfully help the client, the best tool must be chosen which takes these factors to consideration (Canino &
Spurlock, 2000).
References
Career Assessment Instruments
Brown S.
D. & Lent R.W., 2012. Career Development and Counseling: Putting Theory and
Research to Work. John Wiley & Sons
C.L.C.A., n.d. My Complete List of Career Assessments. Retrieved on 19th August 2014 from http://www.marthabowman.info/my_complete_list.htm Campbell, 2003. Campbell™ Interest and Skill Survey. Retrieved on 19th August 2014 from http://pearsonassess.ca/haiweb/Cultures/en-CA/Products/Product+Detail.htm? CS_ProductID=CISS&CS_Category=psychological-vocational&CS_Catalog=TPCCACatalog
Campbell, n.d. Campbell Interest and Skill Survey (CISS). Retrieved on 19th August 2014 from https://www.statisticssolutions.com/campbell-interest-and-skill-survey-ciss/ Canino, I. A., & Spurlock, J. (2000). Culturally diverse children and adolescents: Assessment, diagnosis, and treatment. New York: Guilford Press.
Fischman, W. (2004). Making good: How young people cope with moral dilemmas at work.
Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Press.
King D., n.d. Define Assessment Tools. Retrieved on 19th August 2014 from http://www.ehow.com/info_8319431_define-assessment-tools.html Roberts, A. R., & Watkins, J. M. (2009). Social workers ' desk reference. Oxford [England:
Oxford University Press
St. Edward’s University, 2014. Campbell Interest and Skill Survey (CISS). Retrieved on
19th
August 2014 from http://think.stedwards.edu/career/campbellinterestandskillsurveyciss
6
Career Assessment Instruments
Whinston S., 2012. Principles and Applications of Assessment in Counselling. United States of
America: Cengage Learning
7
Analysis of a Career Assessment Instrument
August 20, 2014
Abstract
Career Assessment Instruments
2
Career assessment is important for every individual so as to understand their expectations. There are different tools which are used in assessing individuals’ career expectations. These tools can be used to help individuals to come up with conclusions in what they want to do with their lives.
However, this should be done with a lot of care to achieve good results. Career assessment instruments are used to measure psychological-personal characteristics which include amplitude, interests, skills and personality type. In dealing with these tools, one has to understand their
limitations …show more content…
in order to come up with good results.
Career assessment instrument
Assessment instrument is a method used to collect information concerning learner’s performance and understanding about a certain topic (King, n.d). For individuals to understand how a variety of personal attributes impact their potential success and satisfaction with different career options and work environments, they require an instrument to assist them. This instrument is called the career assessment instrument. There are several types of career assessment tools designed to help individuals assess themselves. These tools include the work interest quiz, the
Keirsey Temperament sorter, Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, strong interest inventory, career key, focus career and Educational planning Solutions, the Campbell Interest and skill survey among others (C.L.C.A., n.d).
In this paper, the Campbell Interest and Skill Survey instrument will be discussed. Campbell Interest and Skill Survey
Career Assessment Instruments
3
The Campbell Interest and skills survey is a 320- item instrument. It is used to assess vocational interests and self-estimates of skills paralleling interests measured by the inventory
(Brown & Lent, 2012). By using this instrument, the individuals self-reported efforts are compared with various occupations. It uses a seven orientation scale to range the students. These orientation skills are: (a) influencing, (b) organizing, (c) helping, (d) creating, (e) analyzing, (f) producing and (g) adventuring (St. Edward’s University, 2014). Two scores are calculated for each scale: interest which finds how much one likes the specified activities and skills which measures how confident one feels about performing these activities. Then the instrument reports four patterns of combinations of interest and skill scores. These patterns are:
1. Pursue: in this report, both the interest and skills scores are high.
2. Develop: this report shows high interest score but low skills score. It recommends further education, training or experience for better performance and …show more content…
greater confidence. 3. Explore: depicts high skills score but lower interest score. Recommends further exploration to find other interesting areas.
4. Avoid: here, the individual skills and interest scores are low (St. Edward’s
University, 2014).
The reason for the choice of this instrument lies in its ability to make individuals understand their personal attributes including interests, values, preferences, motivations, aptitudes and skills. There are several benefits associated with the use of this tool. The individuals are assisted by the interest scales and the parallel skills scales to gain more thorough understanding of suitable career options. The terms used by this survey are contemporary and
Career Assessment Instruments
4
easily understood. There is the benefit to the individuals in that there is a reflection of respect by the test items to individuals of different gender, race, religion, and national origin. The use of combined gender scales allows for the broadest interpretation of survey results. This tool ensures that assessments can be emailed to clients for them to complete the assessments at their own location by the use of remote on screen administration capacity. This planner leads individuals through thoughtful analysis of results and it also helps them to translate their thoughts into specific actions. Using this tool helps the individual in exploring 299 additional occupations and
159 fields of study and helps them in analyzing their work and education while relating to their values and priorities. Individuals through the use of this tool can be able to identify motivators and obstacles regarding the individual career goals (Campbell, 2003; Fischman, 2004).
The reliability and validity test were investigated over 90 day period. The median testretest reliability coefficients were found to be 0.87, 0.83 and 0.87 for orientation, basic and occupation interest respectively. The skills scales are however shorter and lower coefficients of
0.81, 0.79 and 0.79 were obtained (Campbell, n.d).
To help the client in interpreting the results, it is important to verify the results with other information. In verifying the results, the client needs to be asked if the results are consistent with information like grades, self-perceptions, work performance and other evaluations. By verifying this, you accomplish two goals. First, by providing a method of identifying any problems that may have happened during the testing, and secondly, more client problems are brought in an interpretative process. This verification process assists in that it provides a more holistic view of the client’s abilities and also gives information on other parts of the client’s life (Whinston,
2012).
Career Assessment Instruments
5
When choosing a culturally sensitive assessment tool, the client’s environment should be considered. Influence of the relational processes within the client’s ecological context could impact on their functioning. Family, school environment, peers, neighbourhood, community are some of the ecological relational processes. Factors such as poverty, discrimination and limited opportunities could affect the client. In this context, a multidimensional assessment can assist in choosing the most appropriate multi-modal and multi contextual interventions (Roberts &
Watkins, 2009).
Also, the beliefs of the client need to be known. This is because some clients hold beliefs that make them view some careers as inferior or for certain gender. To successfully help the client, the best tool must be chosen which takes these factors to consideration (Canino &
Spurlock, 2000).
References
Career Assessment Instruments
Brown S.
D. & Lent R.W., 2012. Career Development and Counseling: Putting Theory and
Research to Work. John Wiley & Sons
C.L.C.A., n.d. My Complete List of Career Assessments. Retrieved on 19th August 2014 from http://www.marthabowman.info/my_complete_list.htm Campbell, 2003. Campbell™ Interest and Skill Survey. Retrieved on 19th August 2014 from http://pearsonassess.ca/haiweb/Cultures/en-CA/Products/Product+Detail.htm? CS_ProductID=CISS&CS_Category=psychological-vocational&CS_Catalog=TPCCACatalog
Campbell, n.d. Campbell Interest and Skill Survey (CISS). Retrieved on 19th August 2014 from https://www.statisticssolutions.com/campbell-interest-and-skill-survey-ciss/ Canino, I. A., & Spurlock, J. (2000). Culturally diverse children and adolescents: Assessment, diagnosis, and treatment. New York: Guilford Press.
Fischman, W. (2004). Making good: How young people cope with moral dilemmas at work.
Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Press.
King D., n.d. Define Assessment Tools. Retrieved on 19th August 2014 from http://www.ehow.com/info_8319431_define-assessment-tools.html Roberts, A. R., & Watkins, J. M. (2009). Social workers ' desk reference. Oxford [England:
Oxford University Press
St. Edward’s University, 2014. Campbell Interest and Skill Survey (CISS). Retrieved on
19th
August 2014 from http://think.stedwards.edu/career/campbellinterestandskillsurveyciss
6
Career Assessment Instruments
Whinston S., 2012. Principles and Applications of Assessment in Counselling. United States of
America: Cengage Learning
7