Choose Your Career According To Your Personality Traits

Each occupation requires certain characteristic pattern of abilities and personality traits. For example, to be a successful architect you have to be original, creative, imaginative, systematic, practical, determined, sensitive, patient etc. Psychologists have identified certain types of personalities which are suitable for certain types of jobs.

Though no person will have the same type of personality exactly like which is described below, we still get a good idea of the suitability of specific persons for specific jobs. One way of understanding the relationship between personality characteristics and jobs is to consider the following categories:

Realistic: Persons of this type are energetic and physically strong. They have good motor coordination skills but lack verbal and interpersonal skills. They are, therefore, somewhat uncomfortable in social settings. They perceive themselves as mechanically inclined, and are direct, stable, natural and persistent. They prefer concrete to abstract problems and see themselves as aggressive. Such persons prefer occupations of following types : mechanic, engineer, electrician, crane operator, tool designer etc.

Investigative: This category includes people who have a scientific bent-of-mind. They are usually task-oriented, prone to thinking and are not comfortable with people. They have a great need to understand the physical world and prefer to work independently. They do not like leadership positions, but are confident of their intellectual abilities. These persons choose vocations such as scientist, researcher, zoologist and psychologist.

Artistic: Persons who are artistic prefer unstructured situations with maximum opportunity for self-expression. They are very creative especially in the area of art and music. They avoid problems which are highly structured and prefer living in situations which require self-expression related to art. Such persons prefer occupations of artist, writer, musician etc.

Social: Such persons like to be involved with people and to work in groups and occupy central positions in groups. They are often religious and have good language and interpersonal skills. They enjoy activities that involve informing, training, curing, helping etc. Vocational preferences of such persons include social work, school teacher, religious teacher, etc.

Enterprising: Persons of this type have verbal skills which are very effective for selling, dominating, leading etc. They have a strong desire to achieve organizational goals and economic gains and tend to avoid situations which require intellectual effort for long periods of time. They see themselves as aggressive, popular, self-confident, cheerful, social and have high energy level. Vocational preferences include business executive, politician, property dealer, stock broker, business man, etc.

Conventional: Such people prefer well-ordered environment and like systematic activities involving verbal communication or dealing with numbers. They avoid situations involving social dealing or physical skills. They enjoy power and material possessions. Vocational preferences include banking, clerical jobs, traffic policemen, shop salesman etc.

The categories given above are not to be taken as final  but will give you a good idea about the relationship between personality characteristics and vocational choice. There are overlaps between these categories and most people will not fall exactly in only one of these. Nevertheless, this description captures the important relationship between abilities, personality characteristics, and vocational choice.