1. Facilitating Career Decision-Making
Itamar Gati
The Hebrew University of Jerusalem

2. In this presentation, I will
Discuss the decision-theory viewpoint
Present the PIC 3-stage cdm model
Describe the CDDQ –theoretical basis and practical utility
Introduce the CDSQ – cdm style model and Q
Demonstrate MBCD - Making Better Career Decisions
Review research and demonstrate applications
Highlight the unique features of our approach

3. Question to you -
What word was used in this presentation (if I am careful enough) only twice?

4. But first, how did I get here and why?
age 9 Immigration to Israel
18 – 21 compulsory military service
21 – 24 undergraduate studies (psy+econ)
22 – 24 research assistant of D. Kahneman
24 – 27 MA, Judgment and decision making
27 – 30 PhD Similarity, Amos Tversky
24 – 30 research associate, Hadassah Career Counseling Institute
30 – 31 Fulbright Post Doc – Stanford Uni
31 – assistant prof – to professor, Hebrew Uni

5. Unique features of career decisions
Quantity of Information: Often large N of alternatives and factors, within-occupation variance,  information is practically unlimited
Quality of Information: soft (i.e., verbal), subjective, fuzzy, inaccurate, biased
Uncertainty about: the individual’s future preferences, future career options, unpredictable changes and opportunities, probability of implementing choice
Non-cognitive Factors: emotional and personality-related factors, necessity for compromise, actual or perceived social barriers and biases

6. From decision theory to career counseling practice
Many factors contribute to the complexity and difficulties involved in career decision-making
The claim:
Career counseling may be viewed as decision counseling, which aims at facilitating the clients' decision-making process, and promotes better career decisions

7. If so evident, why was not decision-theory adopted until now?
Because
Normative decision theory is –
too rational
too arbitrary
too quantitative
exceeds human’s information-processing capability
Descriptive decision theory is not helpful either – it mainly documents human weakness
heuristics, biases, and fallacies
limited information-processing capabilities

8. The Proposed Approach –
By adopting decision theory and adapting it to the unique features of career decisions, theoretical knowledge can be translated into practical interventions to facilitate individuals’ career choices
Specifically, we suggest focusing on a prescriptive approach, and designing systematic procedures that can help individuals make better career decisions (not necessarily rational ones!)

9. The 3 components of needs assessment are:
the individual’s stage in the cdm process (“where”)
the focuses of the individual’s cdm difficulties (“what”)
the individual’s cdm style (“who”)

10. I - Stages in the career decision-making process
The PIC model (Gati & Asher, 2001)
separates the career decision- making process into 3 distinct stages:
- Prescreening
- In-depth exploration
- Choice

11. Prescreening
Goal: Locating a small set (about 7) of promising alternatives that deserve further, in-depth exploration
Method: Sequential Elimination
Locate and prioritize relevant aspects or factors
Explicate within-aspect preferences
Eliminate incompatible alternatives
Check list of promising alternatives
Outcome: A list of verified promising alternatives worth further, in-depth exploration

12. Steps in Sequential Elimination
Locating and prioritizing aspects or factors
Explicating within-factor preferences in the most important factor not yet considered
Eliminating incompatible alternatives
yes
Too many promising alternatives? no
This is the recommended list of occupations
worth further, in-depth exploration

13. A Schematic Presentation of the Sequential Elimination Process (within-aspects, across-alternatives)
Potential Alternatives
Aspects
a (most
important)
b (second in
importance) c . n N
Promising Alternatives

14. Final step - Sensitivity Analysis
The Goal:
Verifying the “quality” of the promising list
The Method:
An alternative (compensatory-model-based) search
“why not”
“almost compatible” options
“what if”
“similar alternatives”

15. In-depth exploration
Goal: Locating alternatives that are not only promising but indeed suitable for the individual
Method: collecting additional information, focusing on one promising alternative at a time:
Is the occupation INDEED suitable for me?
verifying compatibility with one’s preferences in the most important aspects
considering compatibility within the less important aspects
Am I suitable for the occupation?
probability of actualization: previous studies, grades, achievements
fit with the core aspects of the occupation
Outcome: A few most suitable alternatives (about 3-4)

16. A Schematic Presentation of the In-depth Exploration Stage (within-alternative, across aspects)
Promising Alternatives 4 5 2
Suitable Alternatives

17. Choice
Goal: Choosing the most suitable alternative, and rank-ordering additional, second-best alternatives
Method:
comparing and evaluating the suitable alternatives
pinpointing the most suitable one
Am I likely to activate it?
if not - selecting second-best alternative(s)
if yes - Am I confident in my choice?
if not: Return to In-depth exploration stage
if yes: Done!
Outcome: The best alternative or a rank-order of the best alternatives

18. II - Career Decision-Making Difficulties
Among the first steps in helping individuals make a career decision is locating the focuses of the difficulties they face in the decision-making process
Relying on decision theory, Gati, Krausz, and Osipow (1996) proposed a taxonomy for describing career decision-making difficulties

19. Possible Focuses of Career Decision-Making Difficulties (Gati, Krausz, & Osipow, 1996)
Prior to Engaging in the Process
Lack of Readiness due to
Lack of motivation
Indeci-siveness
Dysfunc-tional beliefs
During the Process
Lack of Information about
Cdm process
Self
Occu-
pations
Ways of obtaining info.
Inconsistent Information due to
Unreliable Info.
Internal conflicts
Externalconflicts

20. Career Decision-Making Difficulties
This taxonomy was based on:
the stage in the decision-making process during which the difficulties typically arise
the similarity between the sources of the difficulties
the effects that the difficulties may have on the process and the relevant type of intervention

21. The Career Decision-making Difficulties Questionnaire (CDDQ)
The Career Decision-making Difficulties Questionnaire (CDDQ) was developed to test this taxonomy and serve as a means for assessing individuals’ career decision-making difficulties
Cronbach Alpha internal consistency estimate of the total CDDQ score: .92 – .95
For additional information – see the CDDQ is free

22. Empirical Structure of CDM Difficulties (N = 10,000)
Lack of motivation
General indecisiveness
Dysfunctional beliefs
Lack of info. about self
Lack of info about process
LoI about occupations
LoI about addition sources of help
Unreliable Information
Internal conflicts
External conflicts

23. Sample items from the CDDQ

24. The Four Stages of Interpretation
Ascertaining Credibility, using validity items and the time required to fill out the questionnaire
Estimating Differentiation based on the standard deviation of the 10 difficulty-scale scores
Locating the salient, moderate, or negligible difficulties, based on the individual's absolute and relative scale scores
Determining the confidence in the feedback and the need to add reservations to it (based on doubtful credibility, partial differentiation, or low informativeness)

25. The 4 Stages of Interpretation1
Evaluating
Credibility
Not Credible
Doubtful
Credible 2
Estimating Differentiation
Low
Questionable
High 3
Locate Salient
Difficulties
Aggregate
Reasons to Add Reservation (RAR)
Compute Informativeness
(B /W )
B/W < 1
RAR = 3
B/W > 1
RAR ≤ 2 4
Add Reservation
to Feedback
Receives Feedback
No Feedback

26. Four Studies - for validating the proposed interpretation
Method
Participants: career counselors and graduate counseling students
Questionnaires – including CDDQ responses:
- in Study 1 and 4 – all possible responses;
- in Studies 2 and 3 – responses of 16 actual clients
Results:
High similarity within-groups as well as between counselors’ and students’ judgments High similarity between the experts’ judgments and the proposed algorithm at each stage

29. Among the salient difficulties is “lack of information about the career decision-making process” (4)
Three Levels of Difficulties (negligible, moderate, salient difficulty)
in the Ten Difficulty Categories and the Four Groups (N = 6192;
H-Hebrew, E-English, p-paper and pencil, I-Internet)

30. The distribution of types of feedback in the four groups

31. Conclusions
The incorporation of a middle level of discrimination increases the usefulness of the feedback and decreases the chances and implications of potential errors
Adding reservations when appropriate is essential for providing meaningful feedback and decreasing the chances of misleading conclusions

33. III – Career Decision-Making Styles
Diagnosing the client’s career decision-making style is important in order to “tailor” the career-counseling intervention to his or her unique characteristics
Previous research often did not take into consideration the complexity and variety of aspects related to the decision process and classified decision-styles based only on a single, most dominant characteristic (e.g., rational vs. intuitive decision-makers)

34. Goals
Developing a multidimensional model for describing career decision-making styles, based on the assumption that decision-making styles should be described using several dimensions simultaneously (i.e., using patterns of defining profiles)
Developing the Career Decision-making Styles Questionnaire (CDSQ) for testing the model and enabling a more accurate diagnosis of individual’s career decision-making style
Empirically deriving a typology based on cluster analysis of the CDSQ profiles from a large sample of individuals

35. Previous Research
1. 39 labels used for describing decision-making styles were located
2. In light of the high resemblance among some of them (e.g., logical [Arroba, 1977], rational [Harren, 1979], active-planning [Jepsen, 1974], systematic [Johnson, 1978]), these 39 types were narrowed down to 12 prototypes :
rational, perfectionist, procrastinator, searching for tools, satisfying, hesitant, impulsive, fatalist, intuitive, dependent, rebellious, and pleasing.

36. Derivation of the 11 Dimensions
3. Comparing the 12 prototypes in terms of their common and distinctive characteristics allowed us to uncover the various characteristics differentiating among them
4. From this list we derived 11 basic dimensions relevant for characterizing individuals' cdm styles. Each dimension represents an attribute on which individuals can be characterized along a continuum on a bipolar scale: e.g., on the dimension of pattern of information processing individuals can be characterized from "analytical" to "holistic"; desire to please others – "high" to "low".

37. The 11 Proposed Dimensions
Information processing (analytic vs. holistic)
Information gathering (much vs. little)
Amount of effort invested in the process (much vs. little)
Consultation with others (frequent vs. rare)
Aspiration for an "ideal occupation" (high vs. low)
Willingness to compromise (high vs. low)
Locus of control (internal vs. external)
Procrastination in entering the process (high vs. low)
Speed of making the final decision (fast vs. slow)
Dependence on others (high vs. low)
Desire to please others (high vs. low)

38. The Career-Decision-making Style Questionnaire (CDSQ)
44 statements (4 items x 11 dimensions)
Response scale: 1 – Strongly disagree to – Strongly agree
The CDSQ is embedded in career-related self-help Internet sites KIVUNIM.COM (Hebrew), CDDQ.ORG (English)
3 Development samples (N=230, 404, 411)
Fourth sample subjects

39. Future Directions http://www.kivunim.com
An Israeli website in Hebrew, designed for assisting deliberating individuals in making their career decisions. It is a public service and is offered free of charge

40. Results – (Items) Scale Reliabilities: median - .80, range .73 – .85
Factor analysis:
10 factors
Accounted-for Variance = .65
2 dimensions were included in one factor (Speed of making the final decision; Procrastination)
Two items loaded higher on a “neighbor factor” (Information-processing; effort invested)
Cluster analysis:
Accounted-for Variance = .81
Items of 7 dimension clustered perfectly (4/4) 4 dimension – 3/4 items

41. Results - Typology G5 G1 Group G7 G6 G4 G3 G2 DIMENSION n=64 n=87 n=47
5.09
5.35
3.45
5.17
4.76
4.91
3.65
Information-processing
5.79
5.94
3.43
5.83
5.34
5.21
3.94
Information gathering
5.72
6.32
4.62
5.41
6.05
6.06
4.82
Amount of effort invested
5.64
5.33
4.02
6.26
5.58
Consultation with others
2.14
2.56
3.39
2.25
3.12
2.01
4.12
"ideal occupation"
3.03
3.60
5.12
3.33
4.81
3.08
Willingness to compromise
5.61
5.26
6.10
5.24
5.59
Locus of control
4.38
2.47
3.02
5.42
3.24
3.73
Speed of making decision
4.97
3.53
2.58
5.78
2.66
5.10
4.21
Procrastination
6.40
6.19
5.76
6.47
3.89
5.60
6.16
Dependence
5.99
5.69
4.26
4.72
5.88
Desire to please others

42. Conclusions
The proposed and tested 11 dimensions can be used to characterize individuals' career decision-making styles
Using the CDSQ, homogeneous groups of clients with similar career decision-making styles can be empirically identified; creating a novel and more refined multi-dimensional typology of decision-making styles

43. Implications for Counseling
The CDSQ allows a more accurate diagnosis of the counselees' career decision-making styles, thus better “tailoring” the counseling intervention to the unique needs of individuals and groups with different characteristics
The CDSQ allows individuals to learn about their career decision-making style and thus to consider adopting more desirable strategies

44. So far, I reviewed
3 components of client’s needs assessment (the 3 “W”s) :
The individual’s stage in the cdm process (“Where”)
The focuses of the individual’s cdm difficulties (“What”)
The individual’s cdm style (“Who”)
So, what’s next?
Some demonstrations of how can the decision-making approach be implemented in order to actually facilitate clients’ cdm

45. we must then utilize the best available resource:
Specifically, if career decision-making requires collecting a vast amount of information, and if complex information-processing is needed,
we must then utilize the best available resource:
Career counselors’ expert knowledge, that can be elicited and transformed into Information and Communication Technology-based systems
Indeed, - The computer-assisted career guidance systems, based on a decision-theory model, can help overcome human’s cognitive limitations
- There are several computer-assisted career guidance systems available today on the Internet

46. MBCD Making Better Career Decisions
MBCD is an Internet-based career planning system that is a unique combination of
a career-information system
a decision-making support system
an expert system
Based on the rationale of the PIC model, MBCD is designed to help deliberating individuals make better career decisions

54. However,
Although Internet-based, career-related self-help sites are flourishing,
these sites, as well as “stand-alone” computer-assisted career-guidance systems, vary greatly in quality
Therefore,
it is very important to investigate the utility and validity of these self-help programs

55. But, Making Better Career Decisions
Does it really work?

56. Criteria for Testing the Benefits of Making Better Career Decisions
Examine users' perceptions of MBCD
Examine changes in user’s decision status
Examine perceived benefits
Locate factors that contribute to these variables

57. MBCD’s Effect (Cohen’s d) on Reducing Career Decision-Making Difficulties (Gati, Saka, & Krausz, 2003)

58. Decision Status Before and After the “Dialogue” with MBCD
Before the dialogue 1 2 3 4 5
1- no direction 34 7 6
2 - only a general
direction 41 66 15 9
3 - considering a few specific alternatives 27 58 84 30
4 - would like to examine
additional alternatives 23 51 35 54
5 - would like to collect
information about a
specific occupation 20 21 28
6 - sure which
occupation to choose 16

60. Predictive Validity of MBCD (Gati, Gadassi, & Shemesh, 2006)
Design: Comparing the Occupational Choice Satisfaction (OCS) of two groups six years after using MBCD and getting a list of occupations recommended for further exploration:
those whose present occupation was included in MBCD’s recommended list (44%)
those whose present occupation was not included in MBCD’s recommended list (56%)

61. Method
Participants
The original sample included 123 clients who used MBCD in 1997, as part of their counseling at the Hadassah Career-Counseling Institute
Out of the 73 that were located after six+ years, 70 agreed to participate in the follow-up: 44 women (64%) and 26 men (36%), aged 23 to 51 (mean = 28.4, SD = 5.03)

62. Frequencies of Occupational Choice Satisfaction by “Acceptance” and “Rejection” of MBCD's Recommendations (Gati, Gadassi, & Shemesh, 2006)

63. Alternative Explanations – were not supported
Differences in the lengths of the lists
No difference was found in the OCS between clients whose list included 15 or fewer occupations and clients whose list included more than 15 occupations
Clients who accepted MBCD’s recommendations are more compliant, and therefore more inclined to report a high level of satisfaction
However, following the compensatory-model-based recommendations did not contribute to the OCS

64. (279 Women + 79 Men, Mean Age=23; Gadassi & Gati, 2007)
Gender Differences in Directly and Indirectly derived Preferred Occupations
(279 Women + 79 Men, Mean Age=23; Gadassi & Gati, 2007)

65. Summary of Major Findings
PIC is compatible with people’s intuitive ways of making decisions (Gati & Tikotzki, 1989)
Most users report progress in the career decision-making process (Gati, Kleiman, Saka, & Zakai, 2003)
Satisfaction was also reported among those who did not progress in the process
Users are “goal-directed” – the closer they are to making a decision, the more satisfied they are with MBCD
The list of “recommended” occupations are not gender-type biased (Gadassi & Gati, 2007)

66. What I did not review today
Career compromises – framings and their implications
The assessment of career-related preference crystallization (based on the aspects-based approach)
Career indecisiveness (i.e., emotional and personality related career decision-making difficulties)
Core aspects – that capture the essence of occupations
Dysfunctional beliefs – which, why, when

67. In Conclusion – Features of our Approach
Prescreening is essential when the number of potential alternatives (e.g., occupations, majors, jobs) is large
Instead of focusing on occupations (alternatives) we suggest to focus on aspects or characteristic of the options
Instead of the “snap-shot” – static assessments of vocational interests (e.g., the 3-highest RIASEC Holland’s code), use for prescreening a wide range of factors aspects elicited by a dynamic, interactive process

68. In Conclusion – Features of our Approach (cont.)
From the viewpoint of the individual, this enables: - Differentiating between relative importance of factors, the optimal level, and the willingness to compromise - Assessing the individual’s preference crystallization (does s/he knows what s/he is looking for)
With respect to occupations, this enables: - Characterizing occupations in terms of a range of levels, representing the within-occupation variance - Highlighting the essence of the occupation (using the core aspects)

69. We believe that
Career-related assessments can and has to be useful both in self-help and in personal, face-to-face counseling situations
Computers can and should be used not only for scoring (and “arbitrary” feedback), but also for monitoring a dynamic interaction and providing flexible interpretations (including “reservations”)
Experts’ knowledge can and should be elicited, and then transformed to design and improve interpretive feedbacks on assessments

70. We also believe that . . .
Career choices are the outcome of decision-making processes; therefore, career counseling is, in fact, decision counseling
Decision theory can be translated into practical interventions aimed at facilitating individuals’ career decision-making
The goal should be promoting a systematic decision making process – not a rational one

71. Finally, we also believe that . . .
Career-related assessments can be transformed into user-friendly Internet-based systems, which can also be incorporated into counseling interventions
Interpretive feedback is important but has to be “tailored” and validated
Theory-based interventions should always be empirically tested for theoretical validity as well as practical effectiveness

72. And what was the word I used (hopefully) only twice?

73. To conclude
From the presented perspective, the goal of career counseling is
facilitating
making better career decisions

75. end --