Self-Assessments are tools that are used in career development to measure an individual’s preference so that they can use knowledge of that preference to seek out opportunities that match. It has also been scientifically proven that individuals have greater career satisfaction when they can work in jobs matched to their characteristics.
Assessments are used to help one decide what is the next most logical area to consider for their future based on the unique characteristics to that individual. It is not a tool that will blatantly tell you what you should do for the rest of your life. At best, it is a shortcut to help one consider options that are likely to be relevant to themselves, to be used as a starting point if one does not know what they want to pursue as a career/major or if one is considering changing their current career/major path.
FOCUS 2
One of the main assessment resources provided to WSU students for free through the ASCC is FOCUS 2. FOCUS 2 guides users through a reliable, intuitive career and education decision making model to help them, select a major, explore occupations, make informed career decisions and take action in their career development. Within the resource there are five different assessments (listed below) that students can complete and use as a starting point for exploring careers and majors; students can either use one assessment or a mix of assessments for FOCUS 2 to analyze and produce results.
Assessment Types
- Work Interests*
- Personality*
- Leisure
- Values*
- Skills
*The more a career aligns with these assessments, the higher one’s satisfaction.
These interest assessments measure people who work in different occupations and compare one’s results to theirs. It matches peoples’ personal preferences to each other. It does not match a person to a work task even those these five types of results represent themes that people prefer.
Post-Assessment
Once a student has finished any or all the FOCUS 2 assessments, they can schedule a meeting with an ASCC academic coach or career coach to discuss next steps.
Information derived from UNIV 100 course material and the ASCC website.
