Happy Friday Bison,
We are back with another blog in our series highlighting the benefits of Career Exploration. Last time we discussed What Can I Do With This Major which is a tool that features 100 majors and their common career paths and employers. This week will be showcasing one of the most complex and comprehensive tools we have to offer called O*net and how it can be used in combination with both WCIDWTM and Focus 2 Career.
O*net is a complex database sponsored by the US Department of Labor containing information on hundreds of occupations. The data provided to O*net is compiled through the surveying workers in the field. On O*net you can find a wealth of information on many topics such as:Â
- Occupation Specific Information: Day-to-Day Tasks | Technical Skills
- Occupational Requirements: Work Activities | Work Context
- Experience Requirements: Training and Credentials | Skills, Knowledge, and Abilities | Education
- Workforce Characteristics: Wages and Employment Trends | Job Openings | Related Occupations
As you can see, O*net provides an exorbitant amount of information which can be quite overwhelming when you first attempt to utilize it and I find that O*net is best utilized when you pair it with another tool such as Focus 2 Career. My recommendation is to utilize Focus 2 Carrer to identify a handful of positions and careers that you align with and want to learn more about. Using the job title you found in Focus 2 Career, you use the search function found in O*net to find specific information about that job whether it is the education requirements, the national or state average salary, the day-to-day tasks of the job, as well as the employment trends.
O*net can be found on the NDSU Career and Advising Center website in the career support tab under explore. If you have any questions or would like assistance utilizing O*net or any other tool or service offered by the Career and Advising Center, you can stop by our office in Ceres Hall room 306. You can also contact us at 701-231-7111 or at our email ndsu.cac@ndsu.edu.
