Career and Job Research

This guide provides resources to help you research careers, search for jobs, write résumés, gain interview skills, and more.

Why research a career?

Why Should You Research Careers?

There are many questions you should consider when choosing a career, such as:

  • How much money will I make?
  • Can I get this job in Washington?
  • How much school will I have to complete?
  • Do I need to take lots of math classes?

The sources on this page will help you answer these kinds of questions.

Career Exploration & Research with Career Planner

Using Career Planner

After creating your own account, you can use Career Planner to research a specific career - finding profiles on jobs that list requirements, education and training needed, wages, employment outlook, and links to additional resources. Use the search tips below to learn how to better search this database. 

Search Tips

  1. The image below shows how you can search by keyword using the "Career Search" option from the menu on the left. This lets you find information about specific careers you might be interested in.

(click on image to enlarge)

search showing how to search by keyword

 

  1. Alternatively, I recommend browsing a larger set of careers using the "Career Cluster" option from the menu on the left. This is a great way to explore and learn about a range of career options connected to a career area interest. 

(click on image to enlarge)

Search page showing broad topics of jobs

Explore a Specific Career

  • Using the menu on the left, you can search for career information using a simple keyword, as shown in the image below. Or search by larger career fields, interest areas, and personality types, and more.

(click on image to enlarge)

career research page of the database, showing the menu on the left and search boxes to search careers

  • Each career summary includes information on career duties, requirements, training, wages, employment outlook, and links to resources like career associations and more. You can also see a list of related careers. 

(click on image to enlarge)

search results showing tabs of information about each career

Explore Careers by Personality Type & Interest

Search Tips

  • Search for careers by personality type by clicking on "Occupational Personality Types" on the menu to the left. 

(click on image to enlarge)

Search screen showing a list of personality types and related careers

Additional Career Research Tools

Finding Info in Educational Films

Use the Holman Library streaming video collection to find educational videos on choosing a career and getting a job in the field. You can watch an entire show or find relevant chapters, called "segments" on your topic.

You may access Films on Demand off campus. Just go through the library website and enter your SID when prompted.

Follow the steps below:

  1. First, select Careers & Job Search from the drop-down menu called "Collections"

(click on image to enlarge)Screenshot of the Films on Demand database showing the "collections" tool on the menu, and the drop down option for career and job research

  1. Then use the options to the left to focus your career research by topic - such as Career exploration, Career Fields, Job Search Skills, Job Success Skills. Each major area is further broken down by sub-topic. 

screenshot of the database page showing how to pick a larger topic to see the more narrow sections under each, as outlined in the text above the image.

Note: You can also try typing in keywords, such as "engineering career." 

Career Research Tools on the Web

Use the websites listed below to find more information about careers. Find information about what jobs relate to your interests, job characteristics, job pay range, education requirements, job availability, the characteristics of people who do well in that field, and more. 

Professional or Trade Publications

To learn more about a career or industry, read articles on current news, issues, and trends in that field!

Finding Trade Journals

Trade publications contain articles written for professionals in a specific industry.

Use the library database ProQuest to search for articles within trade publications.

  1. Type in a relevant keyword. Ex: hydrologist
  2. Limit to Full Text.
  3. Under Source Type, select Trade Journals.

Here's a screenshot that illustrates these steps. 

(click on image to enlarge)

ProQuest Advanced Search - finding trade journals

Association web sites

Professional associations are organizations that support members of a certain profession. An association helps members of specific field keep current, develop themselves professionally, and come together to discuss important issues in their profession.

An association's web site is a great place to learn about a potential career. Use Google to find an association web site for your profession. Search with your profession name and association (example: librarian association).

Google Web Search

eBooks from the Holman Library to Research Career Pathways

Tags: careers, english, jobs