How to Choose a Career Path: A Step-by-Step Guide

Five Steps Career Experts Recommend

1. Assess your interests, values, personality and skills before looking at job titles
2. Use validated self-assessment tools rather than guessing
3. Research actual occupations using labor-market data, not just job titles
4. Test the fit through informational interviews, internships or job shadowing
5. Treat the decision as something to revisit, not a one-time choice

Step 1-2: Know Yourself With Structured Tools

American University's Career Center frames self-assessment around four areas it calls VIPS: values, interests, personality and skills. It recommends clarifying these before researching specific jobs, using tools such as the CareerOneStop Work Values Matcher, the O*NET Interest Profiler, the Holland Career Code assessment, and personality tools such as the MBTI or Type Finder, with more in-depth instruments like the Strong Interest Inventory or full MBTI typically requiring a certified advisor.

The O*NET Interest Profiler, maintained by the U.S. Department of Labor's O*NET Resource Center, measures occupational interests across six categories known as the RIASEC model: Realistic, Investigative, Artistic, Social, Enterprising and Conventional. The assessment takes about 10 to 20 minutes depending on format, is self-administered and self-interpreted, and is described by O*NET as compatible with Holland's widely used interest structure in career counseling research.

The U.S. Department of Labor's O*NET program also offers a companion tool, the Work Importance Locator, which identifies what a person values most on the job. Together, the department says these tools apply a 'whole-person assessment concept' that links personal attributes to descriptions of more than 900 occupations in the O*NET database.

Comparing the Main Self-Assessment Tools

Step 3: Research the Occupations, Not Just the Titles

Once interests and values are clearer, the next step is checking whether real occupations match them. The Bureau of Labor Statistics' Occupational Outlook Handbook covers about 600 occupations across more than 300 occupational profiles, together representing about four out of five jobs in the U.S. economy, according to the agency's own FAQ page. Each profile lists what workers do, required education and training, pay, and a job outlook category such as 'grow much faster than the average,' which BLS defines as an increase of 7 percent or more in employment between 2025 and 2035.

The handbook can be searched by job title or filtered by pay range, required education, training type or projected growth rate, the BLS FAQ states. For questions beyond occupational facts, such as finding training programs or building a job-search strategy, the BLS directs users to CareerOneStop, a separate Department of Labor-funded resource.

Step 4: Test the Fit in the Real World

Assessments and handbooks describe careers in general terms; direct exposure tests whether a path actually fits. American University's Career Center recommends reaching out to faculty, alumni or other professionals for informational interviews, pursuing internships and extracurricular activities to experience different work settings and organizational cultures, and continuing hobbies or volunteer work that can sometimes evolve into a career.

Step 5: Expect to Revisit the Decision

The Department of Labor describes its O*NET tools as helping people 'consider and plan career options, preparation, and transitions more effectively,' language that applies to students and to workers changing fields later on. American University's Career Center likewise encourages scheduling advising appointments throughout the process rather than treating the first self-assessment result as final.

In practice, this means a chosen career path is a working hypothesis, checked against updated interest results, new occupational data, or lived experience from internships and jobs, then adjusted rather than locked in permanently.