John Holland's Theory of Vocational Choice - Essay Example

Young people trying to decipher what to study and mature adults looking for a career change are sometimes indecisive on what career path to choose. Their peers and family usually tell them to choose a career with the most economic rewards. This seems like a good idea or strategy, but in reality money is not the only one factor that will influence the final decision of a person. John Holland, a psychologist, knows a lot about a person’s uncertainties and he created a model called Holland’s Theory to explain why people choose the career paths they do. This paper describes and analyzes John Holland’s Theory and the six different work environment types of the Holland’s model. It also explains concepts such as congruence, differentiation, consistency and identity in accordance with Holland’s theory. John Holland believes that humans are attracted to particular work environments in accordance with their personalities and backgrounds and they create specific work stereotypes to choose occupations that satisfy their preferred interests and capabilities (WCU, 2006). A premise of the theory is that people are profoundly influenced by their personality in their ultimate selection of a career and there are six types of personality types which every person falls under one of them. Another premise of Holland’s theory is that there are six analogous model environments that reflect the prevailing physical and social settings of a society (Smart & Feldman, 1998). The six personality types are interrelated and can be cross referenced with the six work environments and the a person that finds his calling in life will benefit from these environments because the characteristics and abilities of his personality reinforced in this setting. The model below illustrates a hexagonal with the six personality types of Holland’s theory: (WCU, 2006) A realistic personality type are people who enjoy an active and stable lifestyle that gears them towards choosing jobs that are hands on and required manual abilities such as building, mechanics, machinery operation and athletics (John Hopkins University, 2007). These persons like to be outdoor and can not be confined to the strict environment of an office setting. They visualize work as something you can create in which a tangible result in noticeable and the skill level of a person improves with repetition and experience. They are not the best at dealing with other humans in a work setting. A person with an investigative personality type is a problem solver that is very adept at mathematics and scientific activities. He has the ability to solve complex and abstract problems by utilizing his strong analytical abilities and creative thinking. The person values flexible working hours and his motivation is not based on reaching high managerial or leadership position which place high level of responsibilities on managing large amounts of human resources. Among the types of investigative careers the person might pursue are technologist, biologist, chemist and systems analyst (John Hopkins University, 2007). An Artistic person is an eccentric that possess lots of creativity and works best in individualistic settings. They like to express their personalities by creating different things with words such as music, paintings, carvings, sculpturing and writing (WCU, 2007). They also express artistic nature with their physical abilities in jobs involving dancing or acting. These people are not good at following rules and for them a structure setting is an asphyxiating experience. They are very emotional and express that emotion within their work. People with a social personality type are persons that want to work with others to help them solve their personal problems. They are responsible persons, who listen well to others and get great satisfaction from guiding and teaching others by communicating directly with them. They seek opportunities to work in team settings, solve problems through discussions, utilize interpersonal skills, while at same time avoiding any type of activity that involves systematic use of equipment or machines (John Hopkins University. The Social types serve a very important function in society because they are the educators, therapist, psychologist and social workers which we depend on to help us in our learning experiences and to provide guidance to help us our with our personal problems. Enterprising personality types are people that are always thinking of the big picture and possess great levels of ambition. Their two biggest motivating factors are economic gain and power. The have great communicative and interpersonal skills which help them persuade others and make them great negotiators. They display a level of confidence all the time which makes them a perfect fit for managerial, diplomatic and self-employed positions such as business owners. They are dominant and love to express themselves in front of a crowd to express their ideas and to fulfill the personal desire of getting the attention of others. Despite all their abilities and confidence, they usually lack scientific abilities and dislike working jobs with repetitive tasks and boring routines. A conventional personality is a person with traditional values and enjoys working indoors in comfortable settings in which he knows his exact role within an organization. The person is aware of who everybody inside a company and respects authority. He does not necessary seek leaderships roles, but can be very effective at middle management positions. He dislikes ambiguity and prefers to follow exact procedures with a systematic system. In life they avoid personal relationship and prefer casual ones, while at work like things to go exactly as planned and get very upset when someone interrupts their daily routine (WCU, 2006). There are four secondary constructs which influenced Holland’s Occupational theory. They are congruence, differentiation, consistency, and identity. Appendix A illustrates a table which shows the correlation between the secondary constructs and other variables associated with them. Consistency is the degree of the relatedness between personality types or between environmental models (Bullock, 2006). Consistency within the hexagonal model is based in the sequence of the different types within the model. The personality type 1 is the realistic, the rest are label in sequential order from right to left. A person with social and enterprising characteristics follows the construct of consistency. The actual relationship between the different levels within the hexagonal model is called calculus (Bath, 2002). Differentiation is the level of definition or distinctiveness between personality profiles (Bullock, 2006). The more a person’s specific characteristics and abilities resemble that of a personality type, the more that individual is differentiated from those around him. A person that has multiple characteristics which can be attributed to the different personality types is considered an undifferentiated person. It is likely that an undifferentiated person switches from job to job due to the fact that this person has plenty of interest and wants to try different types of working environments in search for the one the person will feel most comfortable in. Congruence is the degree of match between a person and his work environment (Bullock, 2006). A good congruence between a person’s personality and his or her environment is expected to be associated with such outcomes such as satisfaction, stability, achievement and personal adjustment (Bath, 2002). A high level of congruence at work would be considered by Holland’s theory a very good thing since the person is in an environment in which the individual will thrive. His work will get the person involved in activities that he values, thus the end result is a work environment which brings the person satisfaction, happiness, and professional success. Identity or coherence represents a person’s goals, talents or interests, if there happens to be a strong identity then the person has stable and clear personal goals, talents and interests (Bath, 2002). John Holland’s Theory is a very informative tool that can be utilize by employers to select the right path of talented human resources they want to move up the corporate ladder. It can also be utilize by recruiters to determine if a candidate fits the profile required to perform a certain type of job. High school counselors can utilize the model to help students determine which educational experience suits the person’s personality and interests. The model is very useful and has multiple applications. It is a tool that can help people find the right balance between work and personal life since it helps humans locate a career that will help them satisfy their personal needs by exposing the person to the types of tasks the person loves to perform. References Bath, A.S. (2002). The Relationship between person environments congruence and fundamental goals for African American and European American, Female College Students. Retrieved August 12, 2007 from http://www.ohiolink.edu/etd/send-pdf.cgi?osu1056649233 Bullock, E. (2006). Self-Directed Search Interest Profile Elevation, Big Five Personality Factors, and Interest Secondary Constructs in a College Career Course. Retrieved August 11, 2007 from http://etd.lib.fsu.edu/theses/available/etd-05012006-200420/unrestricted/EB_dissertation[1].pdf Feldman, K. , Smart, J. (2004). What Do College Students Have to Lose? Exploring the Outcomes of Differences in Person Environments Fits. Journal of Higher Education, 75(5), 531. Retrieved August 5, 2007 from EBSCOhost database. John Hopkins University (2007). John L. Holland’s General Areas of Career Interest. Retrieved August 5, 2007 from http://hrnt.jhu.edu/cmp/HollandTypes.cfm?SMSESSION=NO Wcu.edu (2006). John Holland Occupational Congruency Model. Retrieved August 5, 2007 from http://www.ceap.wcu.edu/kirk/CDTheories/Holland_occupcong_theory.html Appendix A: Correlation between secondary constructs and relevant variables (Bullock, 2006). Read More