Are there any career track evalutation tools for someone who doen't know what they want to be when they grow up?

December 16, 2005 9:17 AM

I remember taking a long sort of evaluation test in high school where it asked question regarding career interest. At the end, it would provide suggestions, though broad range, gave a good idea. I have not been able to find something like this online (I know, it seems strange) or usually are not very comprehensive. Any ideas?
posted by _zed_ to Work & Money (17 answers total)

That was most likely the ASVAB (Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery, irc), but according to their website it's only administered to high school students and postsecondary students. However, this directory might offer a few ideas (I'd pick a couple, but really, I don't know anything about them, plus some may be more appropriate to you than others).
posted by artifarce at 9:22 AM on December 16, 2005

The Occupational Information Network might be what you are looking for. They maintain a database of occupations and provide some tests on which recommendations are made. I am not sure which or how much of this is available online. I would suggest having a look around the site . There might even be some software that you could download and run locally, I cant recall but have a vague recollection, that there is.
posted by kenaman at 9:23 AM on December 16, 2005

I believe these were called the DATs (at least, they were called that when I took a similar test c.1987 -- this was before Digital Audio Tape had come on the scene. I believe this stood for Differential Aptitude Test, and here's a Google search on that term to get you started.
posted by Dr. Wu at 9:23 AM on December 16, 2005

Is it the Campbell™ Interest and Skill Survey?
posted by SheIsMighty at 9:27 AM on December 16, 2005

Check out this web tickle test!
posted by richardhay at 9:28 AM on December 16, 2005

assessment.com
posted by miss tea at 9:37 AM on December 16, 2005

Oh hey, this isn't really an answer so much, but I remember taking something like that a couple times and, no joke, I came up "poultry veterinarian" more than once. I never really pursued that route, so I guess I can't be sure it wasn't spot on, but I guess what I'm really saying here is I think these tests can be pretty wack and I hope you're not planning to base any major life decisions on whatever results you might get.
posted by thirteenkiller at 9:39 AM on December 16, 2005

Second the ASVAB.
posted by Fat Guy at 9:59 AM on December 16, 2005

I remember those...we even had one section which measured manual dexterity. It was a page full of tiny arrowheads which one would have to connect to each other by drawing several hundred quarter-inch-long lines. I have a feeling it was more of a "how much tedium can you stand" test.

They were referred to then by the acronyms COPS and CAPS.
posted by plexiwatt at 10:10 AM on December 16, 2005

Best answer: The Strong Interest Inventory is a very strong possibility - commonly given in high schools.

I remember mercilessly sneering at this with my angst-ridden, misfit friends when we had to take it our junior year. We thought it was such BS. Last year, while going through some old papers, I found my Strong Interest Inventory report, complete with top 10 career possibilities for me. It was f*ing spot on.
posted by Miko at 10:12 AM on December 16, 2005

Meyers-Briggs tests also do this same thing.
posted by scazza at 10:15 AM on December 16, 2005

I took that, too. I think it may be the Strong Interest Inventory Miko mentions. There was no true testing of aptitude -- no little arrows, no analogies -- but just an exhausting series of questions about the types of activities you preferred. I think the six General Occupational Themes were Social, Artistic, Investigative, Conventional, Enterprising -- and Concrete/Outdoorsy? (I knew I was I-A-S, but I don't remember the other categories too well.) And yeah, its list of suggestions was surprisingly close to the kinds of work I've taken on as an adult.

It's available online (at a cost) here. I found a PDF mentioning the current version of it, which looks more complex than the version I took in the 70s/80s.
posted by maudlin at 10:48 AM on December 16, 2005

thirteenkiller writes "but I remember taking something like that a couple times and, no joke, I came up 'poultry veterinarian' more than once."

We did three rounds of CISS (I think) in high school. Most of the guys in my AP Math/Chemistry block scored high for "wine taster". It's too bad you need to pay at SheIsMighty's link, I would have like to see if that is still a good career goal.
posted by Mitheral at 10:57 AM on December 16, 2005

CareerCruising.com!
As part of our mandatory Careers credit, our (Canadian) high-school class had to Cruise for Careers with their online survey.
It was really a bit of a joke. It suggested I be a garbageman, a CEO or a florist, among other things.
Apparently you need a username and password to get in. A quick Google gives me
username: "ceridian"
password: "lifeworks"
posted by Count Ziggurat at 12:02 PM on December 16, 2005

if you're looking for a career fairy, rather than doing research/etc, I definitely appreciate the need for advice on stuff like this, but it might be useful to just make your own lists of a)tasks you enjoy, b)goals you enjoy working toward, c)tasks you're good at, d)personality traits [i.e., 'people person'; 'novelty seeker', etc] - and so forth, & then compare these to various career options, including seemingly outlandish ones. That's what I did when I was trying to decide whether to go back to school, and if so, for which discipline, and it really was helpful to just lay everything out like that...
posted by mdn at 12:15 PM on December 16, 2005

Thanks Count Ziggurat - it thinks that I'd make an excellent Explosives Specialist! I'm not sure if the lack of opposable thumbs will hurt my chances, though.
posted by PurplePorpoise at 1:10 PM on December 16, 2005

The CareerCruising test, amusingly, told me I'd make a good career advisor.
posted by MadamM at 3:41 PM on December 16, 2005