motivation

I’ve been going through this sort of mid-life crisis (I don’t know what else to call it). To keep me out of my wallowing and self-pity and mild depression over things I can’t seem to control, my husband suggested I take a test. Normally, I run from tests. But this one I actually liked the sound of. He suggested I take a test to see what I’m good at.

Now, I like to think I know what my strengths are. Besides a rapier wit and a sarcastic mouth that is. 😉 He said when he was going through a similar situation, he took a career assessment test and it told him his strengths and weaknesses, what motivated him and what jobs he would be good at. I thought that was interesting, so I did a search online and found a place to take the test. I’ll share the link in a little bit.

The test itself has over 70 questions. Each question has three multiple choices, which you have to answer two. Least/Most type questions. You have to pick out of the three choices what you would least like to do and what you would most like to do. So I went through the questions. The thing that annoyed me, though, is I had to pay to get my results. It took me several weeks to get up the nerve to pay for them to see what this test thought about me. (The starter package, by the way, is $19.95 – really a fairly inexpensive cost).

So, today, I’m going to share a summary of my results with you. Lucky you! 😀

The results are in sections. First up: Narrative Interpretation. It identifies the ideal job contact by identifying motivations and preferences (Worker Traits) and are listed in order or priority. I’ll post the assessment and my response in bold.

• Enjoys social or vocational interaction with others but is not dependent on direct contact and association. Can function apart from others, without the need for social breaks. True. I like to chat every now and then, but when I’m ready to get down to work, I really want to be left alone. I like associating and interaction with people but I value my independence.
• Can include routine, organized and methodical procedures, but not a need or dependency. Most likely to adapt immediate preferences to change if it isn’t too sudden, radical or descriptive. Strike a good balance between stability and flexibility. Totally true. Don’t like my daily routine disrupted without fair warning.
• Little need for or is not motivated by recognition, status or competitive gain. Comfortable and satisfied with a subjective estimate of self in relation to others, opinions others hold about this person do no present serious effects, one way or the other. True. I think “employee of the year/quarter/month” is nothing more than a popularity contest.

Temperament section identifies motivation and talent an individual possesses in twelve Worker Trait Areas and coincides with interest section. Again, listed by priority.

• A strong preference to work under management or supervision of others who are competent and knowledgeable in their area of expertise. Yes. All I need is a little direction and then I can take something and run with it. I don’t need to be micro-managed, but I do need to be managed to a certain degree.
• Good ability to remember, find and use exact detail. Sure, if it comes to movie quotes. 😀 I agree with this to a certain degree. I remember things if it’s something I’m interested in or something that means something to me.
• Sees self as talented, self-sufficient and goal-oriented. Regards work activity and goals as more important than association, interaction or involvement with people. Is motivated and equipped to work with or manage others but independent, self-directed, self-achieved activity is preferred. Yes on all accounts.
• Prefers independence from social, vocational and recreation involvement with others. First priority is given to self and self-interest.
• Perception, thinking, logic, decisions and actions are more than likely based in fact, resulting from personal experience.

Aptitude: generalized section in which narrative focuses on combination of motivations and preferences as they relate to personal talents and skills.

• Preferences motivated by such things as sensing and seeing aesthetics, essence, philosophical and psychological meaning and effect of color. Probably doesn’t consider the saying, “Beauty is more than skin deep” as cliche. Would probably make a permanent mental note of the quote from Carl Jung, “The artist is essentially the instrument, and he stands below his work, for which reason we should never expect from him an interpretation of his work work. He achieved his highest with his composition.” No real comment but I’m fascinated by this piece of information.
• Relies on a natural ability to retain and recall great detail. See Movie Quotes. Is there a vocation for THAT? 🙂
• Preferences toward “literary and/or communicative” are or could become basis for sufficient motivation to be vocationally important.
• Preferences do not deter from seeing the big picture and handle things in that larger context. This ties yesterday and tomorrow to today, ties possibilities to present fact, and leaves open instead of colored systems. Useful combination if involved in analysis, planning, strategy, assessment and choice of options.

People and how I relate in priority order.

• Motivated to voluntarily communicate to others with the intent or hope that the information will be in their interest and for their benefit. Probably more strongly motivated in benevolent and literary traits.
• Moderately motivated by being “on stage” in order to pleasantly influence others toward a particular viewpoint, objective, or product. Writing books? 🙂
• Has little interest in, or awareness of, or motivation to consider the personality, motives, and interest of others. Self-awareness comes first and self-interest has priority.  Oh, ouch. Luckily this is lower on the priority list
• Rather than motivation for putting others first, preferences revolve around self as a first priority. Gotta look out for #1

Things and how I relate

• Ability to be perceptive and alert relative to monitoring operational processes by use of technical recording instruments. Could be called operational/clerical because it means monitoring what is going on. Interesting.
• Moderate interest in working with machines/craft tools.
• Engineering activities, regarding mechanics, systems, etc., do not fit vocation interests. You aren’t kidding!

Data and how I relate

• Compiling means more than simply gathering large volumes of data sheets and stuffing them in a filing cabinet. Motivated to find, identify, classify, store, remember, and retrieve what is important or what might be important for future use. (NOTE: This is crucial for researchers, technical writers, lawyers, academic teachers, consultants, systems engineers, and programmers). This trait indicates a subconscious preference we could refer to as a “packrat” orientation, i.e., if it glitters; stuff it in the nest along with everything else because it might be useful sometime. Other traits will indicate how motivated the individual is to be thorough, practical, and efficient within this trait. Okay, I just love this whole thing, especially the “glitter” line. And this explains a lot about my clutter tendencies.
• Does not prefer analytical, exploratory or investigative activities.

Reasoning and how I relate

• Naturally motivated to use and apply rational formulas, rules, systems, and/or procedures to deal with concrete variables where only limited instructions or guidelines exist. Emphasis here is on solving operational or administrative PROBLEMS that develop in familiar areas. This is commonly known as ‘troubleshooting’. Motivation is derived from a goal of getting the “train back on the track”. (NOTE: This trait requires onsite familiarity with operations, a sense or suspicion of where things might or could break down, and savvy about ways to fix the problem). Agreed
• Depending on situation, prefers simple, routine tasks in a familiar environment. Good trait for operational, administrative, or clerical activities. Three kinds of persons typically have issues with this kind of job: 1) Those who don’t hear (sometimes won’t hear) or remember specific instructions, 2) those who feel entitled or licensed to do it some other way, and 3) those who simply cannot, for many reasons, “keep their nose to the grindstone” in such basic, routine tasks.

Mathematical Capacity and how I relate to applied usage of math (I’d really like to skip this section altogether haha)

• Unique motivations for working with math; she is deliberate enough, concentrates enough, figures enough, and watches detail enough to be able to add, subtract, multiply and divide to come up with the right numbers. For some otherwise bright people, this is hard to do or very unlikely to happen (e.g., dialing a phone number or putting the right address on an envelope). Transposing numbers may be a problem for some persons, so this unique preference with regard to math may not always register for this worker trait. This means I need a calculator or Excel to be effective *grin*
• Theoretical, abstract math does not define a preference and perhaps math itself simply may not be a motivational factor. Math and I aren’t friends

Language and how I relate

• Motivated to describe, explain, teach, illustrate, and interpret. This is a journalistic trait dedicated to inform people. Social, leadership, influential, technical, service, and functional traits are involved as well.
• Motivational levels support activities including word processing in its widest application: administrative, secretarial, editing, library referencing, management information systems, electronic transmission of information, etc. Preferences lean heavily toward proper language usage, spelling, punctuation, keyword identification, referencing, and cross-referencing. Attention to detail is essential and remains a motivational factor in vocational activity and success. Like writing, perhaps?
• Creative writing and communicating preferences that are important vocational motivators. Yes!

So there you have it. I know this is long, but the assessment itself was ten pages. I cut a good portion of it out. Most of the stuff was repetitive anyway. A few of the first vocation suggestions: editing, secretarial, corresponding. Interesting. And they all seemed to “fit” me. Who I am and what I like to do. I purchased the “starter package” so I could see all my results. It cost $19.95. If you want to take the test yourself, you can do that here.

Have you ever taken an assessment test? What were the results?

I may have to take the Myers-Briggs now to see how my personality fits in with all this. 🙂