Exploring Career Options
Career Planning Stages
Selecting a Major and Planning Your Career
Career Resources and Information
Additional Resources for Education Students

Exploring Career Options
Career exploration begins with self-discovery.  Prior to selecting or changing a career field, it is important for you to carefully identify your values, interests, personality traits, abilities, aptitudes, and lifestyle preferences. Thinking about these items as they relate to work will help you identify the career fields, work environments, lifestyle and job functions that you want to explore.


Changing Your Career    
Changing can be a challenging decision.   Utilize the following Assessment Tools to assist you in identifying your values, interests and skills. 

• CHOICES
  Choices is a free online career exploration program for Defiance College students that includes a database of over 650 occupations.  Choices contains national and Ohio career data, including occupations descriptions; related websites; education needed; related skills, abilities, and work values; job outlook; and earnings.
  
  Choices also includes the “Interest Profiler”, an assessment that will help identify occupations that match your career interests.  Other built-in assessments include the “Work Values Sorter” to identify occupations that match your work values, and the “Career Finder” to identify occupations that fit several of your preferred career characteristics, such as educational level, earnings, career areas, etc.  Other sections of Choices will help you find information about specific graduate or professional school programs throughout the country.  Contact the Career Development Office for a SiteID to access the site.

• Myers-Briggs Type Indicator
  The MBTI is the most widely used personality inventory in the world.  The MBTI instrument determines preferences. Combinations of these preferences result in 16 distinct personality types. Understanding characteristics unique to each personality type, provides insight on how one communicates and interacts with others and can help you make career and personal decisions.  Contact the Office of Career Development to take the MBTI.

• Networking
  Networking with alumni and industry experts is another great strategy to help you plan your career path.  The Office of Career Development can help you learn how to network and to conduct informational interviews. 
  
  
• Career Resources and Information
  Use these career-related resources to research career options, explore various industries, and prepare for your job search.