Warm Up: Job Characteristics Answer in complete sentences. 1.What job setting do you want to work in? 2.Describe your ideal career based on what you have learned.

Activity 137: Job Characteristics Objective: To help students understand the broad career interest areas and the types of jobs in each area.

Job Characteristics Today, workers have more options than they did 20 or 30 years ago. Technological advance have created hundreds of new jobs. Society has changed! The workplace has evolved to have: Flexible hours, job sharing, and telecommuting which were unheard of in the not-too-distant past. Today, more people than ever are starting their own businesses as well!

Job Characteristics Cont. Some people are enticed by these new possibilities, others prefer to work in more traditional settings. The new ways of working will probably give you more freedom, but usually involve more risks and offer less security. Traditional jobs offer more security and possibly, less anxiety.

Consider Your Options Full-time job: Calls for hours or more per week. Part-time job: Calls for less than 35 hours per week. Composite Careers: Having two or three jobs at the same time. You might be a construction worker and cabinet maker. Combine secure jobs with more high risk jobs.

Structured vs. Flexible Hours Structured Hours: Strictly prescribed and probably monitored work hours. For example: 8 a.m. – 5 p.m. Monday – Friday. – You are expected to be at your job ON TIME! If you are the news anchor for the 10pm news, you better be at your desk at 10 p.m. when the cameras start rolling! Flexible Hours: Work hours that provides more leeway. – You might be able to work any 8 hours you’d like to between 7am and 7pm. – Self-employed people can be free to set their hours any way they’d like.

Pay Working for a salary: Being paid by the hour or by the month. Working on a freelance or commission bases: Paid by the job or paid by commission (a percentage of their sales). Freelancers are paid by the job. Salespeople and agents are paid commissions, usually a percentage of their sales. Example: If a real estate broker receives a commission of 6 percent, they would earn $6000 for listing and selling a $100,000 house.

Location Telecommuting: Combines the security of working for an established company with the flexibility of completing your work at home. While telecommuting, you might live in Boulder, Colorado while the company is based in California or New York….but still work from home!

Locations Home-based Business: Technology has helped make it easier to start and maintain a home- based business. You could have all the software programs, fax/printer machines, and the internet to assist you in working from home. Many internet programs can help you be your own bookkeeper, graphic artist, marketing expert, and shipper making the job easier to complete from home!

Career Types Lifetime Career: Having the same job, or kind of job, throughout your lifetime. Sequential Career: series of different career throughout one’s life.

Anxiety Anxiety: To worry or fear about future uncertainties. Anxiety isn’t all bad. Up to a certain point it will help you do a better job. Example: If you are afraid of tomorrow’s science test, you are more likely to prepare for it. If you have too much anxiety, you will be too nervous to do a good job and your performance will suffer.

Anxiety Tolerance Anxiety Tolerance is how well you can deal with fears and uncertainties. Some people feel that, “anything can happen,” or are confident that they can deal with whatever problems come along. People with low anxiety tolerance find worry and fear hard to deal with. Learning to tolerate discomfort is important. Learning to act in spite of your fears is a sign of maturity.

Activity 137: Job Characteristics Circle one job characteristic from the chart either from column 1 or 2. Did you circle more characteristics in column 1 or in column 2? Column 1: Represents careers that have fewer risks, higher security, and less freedom. These careers allow for a lower level of anxiety tolerance. Column 2: Represents careers with greater risks, lower security, and more freedom. These careers call for a fairly high anxiety tolerance.