When I bring up assessments with clients, their reactions vary. I’m amazed at clients who arrive at my office with a briefcase full of assessments and still want to take more! By contrast, other clients are skeptical about taking assessments. However, the vast majority of clients are relatively open to taking a few assessments, if they see a direct link to how their results will help them move forward in their career. As coaches, how can we sort out the best use of assessments?

A good way to get started is to ask your clients what’s going on  and what sort of assistance they’re seeking. Depending on the response, you can determine whether (or not) to use assessments and which assessments will work best. Here are some scenarios to help you sort out the appropriate use of assessments.

When clients say they know what their desired jobs and companies are but want a competitive edge, suggest they uncover their greatest assets and differentiators through a combination of coaching and a personal branding assessment, e.g., 360° Reach assessment (www.reachcc.com/360Reach) Then, you can assist them to incorporate their brand message into a verbal bio, resume, etc.

When clients share how much they dislike their current company’s management style and culture but like their work, you can suggest that you work together to heighten their awareness about their most important values. And, that can be accomplished through coaching and administering a values assessment, e.g., O*NET® Work Importance Profiler^TM (www.onetcenter.org/WIP.html)

When clients indicate they dislike the work itself and want to find a more satisfying career, suggest a combination of assessments and coaching. In this situation, it’s best to use a combination of a personality type assessment, e.g., M.B.T.I.^® (www.cpp.com), an interest inventory, e.g., Career Liftoff Interest Inventory (www.careerliftoff.com), and a strengths or skills assessment, e.g., Clifton StrengthsFinder 2.0 (www.strengthsfinder.com), SkillScan (www.skillscan.com).

When clients say they desire more fulfilling work and want to leave a lasting legacy, coach them on their vision, purpose, values and passions. A card sort to help them zero-in on their purpose is Calling Cards: A Journey of Discovery (www.inventuregroup.com). Also, e-life Plans (www.elifeplans.com) is a useful web-based system where your clients may record dreams, purpose, goals, actions, and timeframes, and then, set-up regular e-mail reminders for specific goals or dreams.

Referencing the above situations will help you determine a strategy to use assessments with specific clients situations. Feel free to let me know of other client situations you have and I’d be happy to post on them later.

Copyright 2010. Nancy Branton

Although employers use ability assessments for employee selection, few career coaches offer ability assessments to their candidates. Below is information about four ability assessments which will raise your candidates’ awareness of their job related abilities.

1. Battery of ability assessments in Test Your Own Job Aptitude: Exploring Your Career Potential

In addition to exploring one’s personality, motivation, and interests, this handbook includes these short, paper-and-pencil ability assessments that measure the following areas:

• Verbal reasoning
• Numerical reasoning
• Perceptual reasoning
• Spatial ability
• Technical ability
• Acuity skills
• Analytical ability

After they complete the assessments, have them note their two highest scoring abilities and review typical occupations for their unique combination of abilities. (E.g., the verbal/numerical combination links to Commercial Managers, Senior Administrators, Insurance Agents and Head Teachers).

2. O*NET® Ability Profiler (AP)™

The AP helps candidates identify occupations that fit their abilities. The nine job related abilities measured are:

• Verbal Ability
• Arithmetic Reasoning
• Computation
• Spatial Ability
• Form Perception
• Clerical Perception
• Motor Coordination
• Finger Dexterity
• Manual Dexterity

Typically the AP is provided by workforce development professionals who have been trained to administer it. Ability results link to over 800 occupations in O*NET OnLine. Click here for further details on the administration of the AP.

3. The CALL: A Vocational and Life Purpose Guide

This Christian-based, online assessment measures 27 distinct dimensions and shows occupations that best match the candidates’ results. The six abilities are measured in this assessment are:

• Cognitive ability
• Learning Pace
• Verbal Skill
• Verbal Reasoning
• Numerical ability
• Numeric reasoning

Candidates may purchase this assessment at The Call http://www.thecallonline.com or take it through a coach who has completed The CALL assessment certification training. A detailed report is provided to the candidate which highlights occupations that best match their profile.

4. The Highlands Ability Battery

This online, three-hour battery of tests includes nineteen different work samples. It measures candidates’ natural strengths, along with personal style that cluster results into these four broad areas:

• Personal style, e.g., generalist, introvert
• Driving abilities, e.g., classification, idea productivity, spatial relations visualization;
• Specialized abilities (design memory, verbal memory, number memory, visual speed, etc.
• Vocabulary

A 30-page report is generated from the battery of tests. A trained facilitator interprets the candidates’ results and guides them into careers that best fit their natural strengths. A list of affiliates who are trained to administer this assessment can be found at Follow Your Calling.

Since people’s abilities influence their career success, it is wise for career coaches to incorporate ability assessments as part of the overall career assessment process for candidates. If you know of other good ability assessments, I invite you to share them.

Copyright 2010. Nancy Branton.

“I hate my job!” If you’re a coach or counselor who, like me, has worked with thousands of individuals, then you’ve heard this phrase hundreds of times, at least!

If you’re client expresses this sentiment with genuine emotion, remind them that the power to change their career is right under their nose…well, behind the nose actually! Stored in our brains are memories about events and activities we truly enjoyed in life since childhood.

Ask them to do a quick inventory from childhood years (ages6-12), then teen years (ages 13-19), then young adult years (ages 20-29), then thirties, forties, and so on. In each period, there are specific examples. Help them create a shortlist of their top 10 most enjoyable events.

The Power of Story

The power of our stories is in the facts, people, and events of our lives. These stories are like veins of gold that run through our life. Mining gold, however, involves moving a lot of ore with tools and equipment to get at that precious metal.

Similarly, mining the veins of gold in our life is easier when we use the tool of writing. Help them write about what is important to them, not what they did to please others. Identify those activities that gave them an intrinsic sense of pleasure and satisfaction, where the rewards were more internal than external.

Brutal Honesty

Above all, encourage them to be brutally honest about what is they truly enjoyed, as opposed to what they are simply proud of accomplishing. We may be proud of a certain accomplishment but there is no real innate pleasure from the activity itself. For example, many people get high grades in school in order to please their parents, not because they truly love math, or history, or truly enjoy studying and doing homework.

Pick a Format

It actually makes it easier to tell the story if we stick to a proven format. You may want to analyze or evaluate their stories for an accurate and reliable picture of their motivational pattern. Or, you may want to turn the exercise over to a personal story analyst to really nail down the essence of who and what they are in terms of work when they are doing what they enjoy most and doing it well.

For example, our stories can be analyzed to identify and define our Key Success Factors. Please understand that the factors critical to success are very different than personality traits, or the results you get from Myers-Briggs and other personality assessments they may have done.
Career match result

A personal story assessment can answer in very clear, concise and meanginful terms the questions: What are the natural talents they use and consistently bring satisfaction to them when they are doing what they enjoy most and doing it well? What is the subject matter that they gravitate to without even trying? What circumstances or conditions have to exist in the job environment to bring out the best in them? How do they naturally build relationships with others? How do these success factors combine to create an essential motivation; that is, the thing they are best at and best suited for in terms of work?

The Right Picture

This accurate and reliable picture of their right work can be developed into an Ideal Job Description and matched to specific opportunities in the world of work.

Turn the negative “I hate my job!’ into a positive that reinforces your value as a coach and counselor. Give them real hope that is grounded in who and what they are, and show them how that correlates to real jobs in the world of work!

This article is dedicated to Jean Haldane who passed away last month and to her husband Bernard Haldane (deceased) for their lasting legacy of the Dependable Strengths® Articulation Process (DSAP). Today DSAP is in use worldwide in schools, colleges, churches, businesses, correctional facilities, human services agencies, and more.  The Bernards left behind two organizations that continue to carry out their work: Center for Dependable Strengths (CDS) in Seattle, WA; and Dependable Strengths Foundation in South Africa that fosters job creation, worker motivation, and enhancement of skills.

Bernard created the DSAP in 1945 to assist WW II Veterans transition to civilian life. Dependable Strengths® (DS) represent people’s special talents for excellence and are discovered through a peer-assisted group process. Participants identify good memories of what they did well and which gave them a sense of pride and/or accomplishment. In dyads and/or quads, they share their stories of what they did as they were making it happen. Then, their peers give them feedback. Through a process of prioritization, participants walk away with clarity and ownership of their DS—“a skill or talent that shows itself three or more times in the person’s top seven Good Experiences”—and know how to demonstrate their value to employers.

I interviewed Carmen Croonquist, a Dependable Strengths® facilitator and career coach. She said, “The main difference between DS and StrengthsFinder 2.0 is that DS are generated based on people’s memories of life experiences and to which they’re emotionally connected. Whereas, the StrengthsFinder 2.0 provides test takers with data on their top natural talents and provides them with further information to confirm them.” Carmen has applied her knowledge of DS with college students, career clients, and career workshops/classes. She feels it equips them to demonstrate their value to current and future employers.

CDS offers DSAP 5-Day Facilitator Training and public workshops. Through CDS you can purchase resources to learn more about DS. I have found the following three books authored by Haldane/s to be valuable:

1. Gifts: Dependable Strengths for Your Future is a great resource on DS and contains activities to discover one’s DS;
2. Job Finding Power is for lay leaders and has useful information for them to assist the unemployed; and
3. Ministry Explorations: A Total Ministry Support System is a total ministry support system.

CDS, along with Center for Learning Connections and WOIS/The Career Information System, just launched the initiative “Coming Home: Dependable Strengths for Veterans.” You can donate to this cause online.

Wishing you success as you assist your clients in discovering their Dependable Strengths®!

Copyright 2010. Nancy Branton.

— Determine Your Top 5, rank order them, focus on the top three, and be sure you know your #1 Core Value.

Discovering how to make positive life and work choices needs to begin with a person’s value foundation. Many people begin with skills, your natural gifts, or capabilities. This is recommended by many and is also important. My suggestion however is to begin with values. Determine your top 5 values, and rank order them. Be sure your purposeful work includes your #1 value. When people attend to all the other components of working their purpose and things still don’t feel like a fit, it is usually that values are not in alignment with important relationships, co-workers, management or the organization.

In the book, “What to Do Between Birth and Death”, Charles Spezzano speaks to the value of time. He says that people don’t pay for things with money; they pay for them with time. If you say to yourself, “In five years, I’ll have enough money to take the trip of a lifetime, then what you are really saying is that the trip will cost you five years — one-twelfth of your adult life. “The phrase spending your time is not a metaphor, “said Spezzano. “It’s how life works.”

Get energy back on your side by visiting and revisiting your values and core principles often. An easy to complete online Values Card Sort is provided compliments of the University of Minnesota, College of Continuing Education as an outreach to the community. Available for personal use, non-profit and pro bono activities you will find it at: http://oca.cce.umn.edu/prototypes/cardsort/values/

Leadership guru, John Maxwell, in his book, “The Maxwell Daily Reader”, encourages us to ask ourselves, “Are the tasks on today’s agenda worthy of your life?” What we spend our time on is what we value. After you complete the Values Card Sort you will want to check your top 5 values against where you have spent your time today, the last week, month, and year. What you spend your time on becomes your life.

In their book, “Be Your Own Brand, A Breakthrough Formula for Standing Out from the Crowd,” my friend, David McNally and his co-author Karl Speak say, “acting in concert with your values not only effects your relationships with others, it also has a highly positive effect on your relationship with yourself.”

Your clear values are your core relationship with yourself. Taking your core values to life and work develops your distinctive, relevant, clear and consistent vision creating authentic confidence. Once you respect yourself in this way others will respect you also.

What are your top 5 values? Is the time you are spending on activities in alignment with your values, particularly your top #1 core value? Knowing your values can be especially helpful and important in personal branding and career change.

SkillScan’s Career Driver Online Assessment

This inexpensive assessment is geared for clients that are ready to embark on a professional career or desire to make a career transition. It is taken online.

Coaches can set up an administrative account to purchase, administer, and download reports for their clients. They can access a Counselor’s User Guide that provides complete information on how administer, interpret, and coach clients on their results. For each section of the report, it provides suggested strategies and sample questions to use with career launcher and career transitioner clients. Also, coaches can download many helpful materials.

It will take your clients approximately 25 minutes to complete this online assessment. They can select either a Career Launcher Report (for people that are new to a professional career) or a Career Transitioner Report (for people that have two or more years of professional experience). After they’ve completed the assessment, they can download their report as a pdf. Coaches can download their clients’ reports through their administrative account.

The SkillScan’s Career Driver report provides a report overview and has four sections.

1.    Your Skill Road Map: lists their top four (out of six) skill categories (analytical, communication, creative, management/ leadership, physical/ technical, and relationship) in rank order, along with their highest rated skill in these categories. Coaches can encourage their clients to review this information to determine how well it aligns with their current or anticipated career.

2.    Road Work: shows skills most critical to their career development, along with development tips. Coaches can work with their clients to create a development action plan.

3.    Road Closures: displays the skills they have little or no interest in using or developing. Coaches can ask their clients how many of these skills they use in their current position. If they’re using a lot of their least favorite skills in their current position, it will bring clarity about which aspects of their job are least enjoyable.

4.    Your Trip Guide: shows their strongest preferred skill sets (out of 18 skill sets), in priority order, with common traits and suggested career options for each of them. Coaches can encourage them to focus attention on their top 2-4 skill sets and identify which of the relevant career options are most appealing. Then, they can explore relevant options in their current or future organization.

5.    Driver’s Test (only in the Career Transition Report): provides focusing activities and actions for them to learn more about their skills, interests, values, and work environment. Coaches can ask their clients to complete these activities, and then, ask them questions to determine the main causes(s) of their career dissatisfaction. Next, coaches can suggest them to brainstorm careers that would better fit them.

6.    Side Trips and Resources: provides them with information and resources to further assess, explore, develop, and promote a future career direction.

In summary, coaching on flow, along with the use of the Knowdell™ Motivated Skills Card Sort or SkillScan’s Career Driver Online assessment, will enable clients to become more clear about the skills they most, and least, enjoy using. Then, the coach can guide their clients to identify a career(s) that will allow them to use their enjoyable skills and stay away from their least enjoyable skills. Finally, the coach can work with them to create a development plan in order to develop their enjoyable skills and move toward their ideal career.

Copyright 2010. Nancy Branton

In my previous blog, I asked the question :  which of the three relational categories do you think is best suited to Sales positions?

The client who most enjoys playing the field, meeting lots of new people, and interacting with others at least 80% of their time on the job? Or, the person who is a natural team player and invests most of their time and energy in maintaining relationships so that ties and bonds strengthen?  Or, the solo artist, the person who loves to work about 80% on their own in a concentrated manner on tasks requiring their expertise?

The answer :  all three are suited to Sales positions if they have a persuasive talent for closing sales!  The relational talent is not a selling talent.  A relational talent helps us understand the kind of role our clients might be best suited for in the workplace.

For example, the client who is multi-relational and tells you stories about how much they like to meet lots of new people at parties, concerts, social mixers, conferences, conventions, network marketing meetings, meet&greet nights, and so on, may fit well into the kind of sales environment that is stereotypical of the profession, i.e. cold-calling impulse-driven sales where establishing rapport quickly and easily is necessary in order to make the sale.  Think of telemarketing, and how important it is to establish a personal connection in the first 30 seconds or so in order to make a sale; or the personal rapport necessary between a used car salesperson and a prospect; or, the trust that needs to be established quickly between a real estate broker and a buyer or seller.

Most sales positions are best suited for the natural team player because most sales are Account Management positions, in which a sales person has a group of accounts that they service.  Their job is about maintaining relationships, getting to know their client or their client’s business really well, getting them to open up about their challenges and issues, in order to determine how the products or service they represent can help their client solve problems and attain their business goals and objectives.  Account managers send out birthday cards to their clients, take them golfing a few times a year, do lunch on a regular basis—they maintain the relationship.  Listen to your client’s stories to find out if they love to join teams, professional associations, family gatherings, and make key contributions to building up relational ties in those groups.

The expert who loves to work solo is suited to technical sales, where it is necessary to know a lot about a particular industry or service in order to sell into that space.  If you are going to sell a nuclear reactor, you probably need a PhD in Physics in order to discuss features and benefits with engineers and physicists responsible for the purchase, installation, maintenance, and repair of such complex machinery and equipment.  The expertise required for technical sales is usually acquired through many hours of solitary study and work.  Listen for clues in their stories that reveal them seeking out opportunities to work alone in depth on personal or professional projects.

Of course, all three Sales positions cover a spectrum of experience related to a particular industry but listen as your clients reveal clues to their natural jobfit for different job scenarios.

Yes, we CAN do a job through sheer determination, even struggle.  But when our natural strengths match the job requirements, we tend to excel, and make it look easy.

What your clients do naturally and effortlessly is revealed through stories about times in their lives when they are doing something they enjoy, and do it well.  As career professionals, all we have to do is listen and map those clues to job opportunities.

Often, my clients say, I don’t like my current job and I want to find more enjoyable work.” It’s important for coaches to assist their clients in disentangling work activities that are intrinsically motivating to perform from those that are not.  Mihaly Csiksaentmihalyi’s concept of “flow” is a great one to introduce to your clients. Also, have your clients take one of these two assessments to discover skills they’re motivated to perform: 1) Knowdell™ Motivated Skills Card Sort, and 2) SkillScan™ Career Driver.

Coaching on Flow
Mihaly Csiksaentmihalyi, author of Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience, conducted research on people and discovered that flow—enjoying what you’re doing and losing track of time—occurs when both the skills and challenge are high. Use some or all of the following questions with your clients to help them uncover work activities they most enjoy and the types of challenging situations they want to use them for.

• Think about a time when you were totally absorbed in what you were doing at work (or in life) and lost track of time? What were you doing? What was challenging about this activity and/or situation?
• When else can you remember being absorbed and losing track of time? (Ask this question several times to pull out various experiences.)
• What common threads do you see in these experiences?
• How could you have more of these experiences?
• What work roles include these activities?
• Where in your current company could you perform these activities?
• Where else you could you perform these activities and experience this same challenge?
• What’s your key takeaway about flow?

Knowdell™ Motivated Skills Card Sort

This is one of several card sorts developed by Dick Knowdell. You can order this inexpensive deck of cards and accompanying worksheets at Career Trainer. Or, you can order and administer this assessment online. Each card lists one activity with a brief definition, e.g., “Conceptualize: Conceive and Internally Develop Concepts and Ideas.” Cards are sorted based on two variables: 1) level of enjoyment, and 2) level of skill. The five levels of enjoyment range from ‘Totally Delight in Using’ to ‘Strongly Dislike Using.’ And, the three degrees of skill range from ‘Highly Proficient’ to ‘Lack Desired Skill Level.’

After your clients have finished sorting the cards, ask them to record their results on a “Motivated Skills Worksheet.” Next, ask them to review their motivated skills—highly proficient in and totally delight in using; burnout skills—highly proficient in and strongly dislike using; and skills to develop—possess little or no skill and totally delight in using their burnout skills. Then, use some or all of the following coaching questions to heighten your clients’ self-awareness about their skills:

• How frequently are you using these motivated skills at work? How could you increase your opportunity to use them?
• How frequently are you using these burnout skills at work? How could you decrease your use of them?
• How could develop the skills you enjoy using but aren’t skilled in? How else?
• What’s your most empowering insight from this card sort?

Note: Watch for Part II of this article during the week of May 24, 2010.

Copyright 2010. Nancy Branton

Do you have clients that are dissatisfied in their current job but express an interest in staying in the same occupational area? For example, Jane is a teacher with a high need for achievement and currently works with a severely retarded population. She expresses frustration in not seeing a great deal of improvement in her students on a day-to-day basis. Instead, Jane might derive greater satisfaction in working with high-potential students.

The best kept secret for a free and excellent career values assessment is the Work Importance Profiler (WIP). It is one of the O*NET™ career exploration tools. The WIP is based on the Theory of Work Adjustment (TWA) that was developed as a result of extensive research conducted by Dawis & Lofquist in 1984. According to the TWA theory, clients have work satisfaction when they possess the skills and abilities needed to perform the job well and the job satisfies their important needs and values.

The WIP assessment is designed for clients who are 16 years or older and read at, or above, the 8th grade level. This assessment highlights the test-taker’s top two work values, and gives scores for each of six career values and the work needs that underlies them. The six career values and the needs associated with them are as follows:

1. Achievement: ability utilization, and achievement.
2. Independence: creativity, responsibility, and autonomy
3. Recognition: advancement, authority, recognition, and social status.
4. Relationships: co-workers, ethics, and social service.
5. Support: company policies and practices, supervision – human relations, and supervision – technical.
6. Working Conditions: activity, compensation, independence, security, variety, and working conditions.

Here are instructions for your clients to take the Work Importance Profiler (WIP):

1. Go to http://www.onetcenter.org/WIP.html
2. In the drop down box, select Work Importance Profiler.
3. Click on Software tab and download the WIP-Software; it requires Microsoft Windows application.
4. Take the assessment.
5. Print out the two pages that provide scores: one page shows the values, and the other page shows the needs.

I have found that it is not necessary or particularly helpful for clients to finish the last portion of the assessment in which they select a job zone and review occupations in that job zone that match their values.

For further information about the WIP, download the WIP User’s Guide. It can be accessed at the same location as the WIP-Software, mentioned above.

After your clients gain awareness about their top values, encourage them to search occupations in O*NET™ OnLine at http://online.onetcenter.org/find and compare their values, and other descriptors, with occupations. Each occupation description includes relevant information for the following things: tasks, tools & technology, knowledge, skills, work activities, work context, job zone, work styles, work values, related occupations, and wages & employment.

With WIP results, your clients gain a greater understanding of what’s important to them in a job. Do your clients a big favor by asking them to take the WIP and coaching them in finding a job that matches their highest work values and needs.

Source: O*NET™ Work Importance Profiler User’s Guide

Copyright 2010. Nancy Branton.

When I bring up assessments with clients, their reactions vary. I’m amazed at clients who arrive at my office with a briefcase full of assessments and still want to take more! By contrast, other clients are skeptical about taking assessments. However, the vast majority of clients are relatively open to taking a few assessments, if they see a direct link to how their results will help them move forward in their career. As coaches, how can we sort out the best use of assessments?

A good way to get started is to ask your clients what’s going on and what sort of assistance they’re seeking. Depending on the response, you can determine whether (or not) to use assessments and which assessments will work best. Here are some scenarios to help you sort out the appropriate use of assessments.

When clients say they know what their desired jobs and companies are but want a competitive edge, suggest they uncover their greatest assets and differentiators through a combination of coaching and a personal branding assessment, e.g., 360° Reach assessment (http://www.reachcc.com/360Reach) Then, you can assist them to incorporate their brand message into a verbal bio, resume, etc.

When clients share how much they dislike their current company’s management style and culture but like their work, you can suggest that you work together to heighten their awareness about their most important values. And, that can be accomplished through coaching and administering a values assessment, e.g., O*NET^® Work Importance Profiler^TM (http://www.onetcenter.org/WIP.html)

When clients indicate they dislike the work itself and want to find a more satisfying career, suggest a combination of assessments and coaching. In this situation, it’s best to use a combination of a personality type assessment, e.g., M.B.T.I.^® (http://www.cpp.com), an interest inventory, e.g., Career Liftoff Interest Inventory (http://www.careerliftoff.com), and a strengths or skills assessment, e.g., Clifton StrengthsFinder 2.0 (http://www.strengthsfinder.com), SkillScan (http://www.skillscan.com).

When clients say they desire more fulfilling work and want to leave a lasting legacy, coach them on their vision, purpose, values and passions. A card sort to help them zero-in on their purpose is Calling Cards: A Journey of Discovery (http://www.inventuregroup.com). Also, e-Life Plans (http://www.elifeplans.com) is a useful web-based system where your clients may record dreams, purpose, goals, actions, and timeframes, and then, set-up regular e-mail reminders for specific goals or dreams.

Referencing the above situations will help you determine a strategy to use assessments with specific clients situations. Feel free to let me know of other client situations you have and I’d be happy to post on them later.