"The paradigm for vocational guidance is to...increase occupational information"

"The paradigm for vocational guidance is to...increase occupational information"

Dr. Mark Savickas recently contributed to the Journal of Counseling & Development and it was insightful. There was one point that I wanted to highlight.  Savickas outlined how vocational guidance works and the second step was to increase occupational information. What does this mean? Why is it important?

Increasing occupational information means knowing what kind of jobs there are and what they do. If you only know about 20 different types of jobs you should learn about 200 more. Every person has a unique vocational identity and it is easier to figure out where your place in the work world is if you have a complete picture. If you believe your choices are limited to doctor, lawyer, accountant, psychologist, and businessman than those are the only jobs you can do.

It is important to make career decisions based on an extensive knowledge of occupations because it betters your chances that you will be at a job that fits your personality.  If your personality doesn’t match any of the jobs you know about there could be negative implications. Two websites that I like to use are bls.gov and onetonline.org.

Feel free to shoot me an email…jonathangoldstein@ymail.com