Holland’s Career Typology Theory

The Holland theory is very beneficial in career choice. The choice of an education program that fits your Holland personality is a very vital step towards success, job satisfaction as well as career well-being, graduation on time and good grades. Your career well-being depends on what you do each and every day(Brown, 2002). The Holland theory is one of the most used theories by professionals. The understanding of this theory and use of an appropriate Holland assessment will help one in the identification of the careers as well as the education programs that are able to fit who you are and thus put one on a path to career well-being(Holland, 1997).

The Holland’s theory depicts the following. In the present culture, most of the people have six personality types. These include investigative, realistic, social, artistic, conventional and enterprising.  These personality types are also the basic six types of work environment. Work involves doing something to achieve a purpose whether it is  volunteering to do a job, hobbies, sports, paid or the unpaid jobs. These are sometimes referred to as Holland Codes. Secondly, the people of the same personality type who are working together can create a work environment that fits their type(Holland, 1997). For example, when people who are artistic work in the same environment, they create a creative work environment, an artistic environment.

People may search for the environments where they can make use of their abilities and skills as well as be able to express their attitudes and values. For example, the artistic types may search for the artistic environment.  People who are working in the environments which matches their personality are more likely to be satisfied and successful(Holland, 1997). For example, a dance teacher who finds a job in a dance school is likely to be satisfied and more successful because the working environment matches their personality. Thus, if a personality type is compatible to your career, then it leads to a greater satisfaction and success.

How one feels and acts at the workplace depends highly on the workplace environment. If one works with the personality that is same as theirs, they will be able to do many common things together and thus are most likely to feel more comfortable with each other.

Most people have a combination of Artistic-Social or Realistic-Investigative personalities. To sum it up, one is likely to choose a job that is satisfying if they choose do something that is fitting their personality type. For one to benefit from this type of theory, they must use a list of the careers and the majors that are assigned accurately to the right personality types (Holland, 1997). One also needs to use accurate measure of Holland’s types of personality that is supported by research.

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