Holland’s Career Personality Types

( http://louisville.edu/career/career-resources/hollands-theory-of-career-choice )

Example Occupations
Realistic: Plumbers, Roofers, Automotive Repair, Farmers
Investigative: Physician, Chemist, Software Engineer, Veterinarian
Artistic: Musicians, Fine Artists, Creative Writers
Social: Counseling Psychologist, School Teacher, Speech Therapist
Enterprising: Real Estate, Restaurant Management, Stockbroker, Sales
Conventional: Inventory Controller, Tax Experts, Data Processors

**Notice that both Realistic and Investigative types have occupations for working with animals,
just in different work environments!
Realistic

● Personality Type: Enjoy using tools and machines and like to solve practical, down-to-earth problems. Usually
realistic people have a hard time tolerating abstract and theoretical ideas.

● Values: Stable Salary, Practicality, “Hands-on work”

● Work Environments: Physical work using machines, tools, or herding animals

Investigative

● Personality Type: Enjoy solving puzzles and problems through the use of science and mathematics. Reading about
the sciences may be a hobby.

● Values: Independent Work, Analysis, Complex, Problem-Solving

● Work Environments: STEM industries requiring analytical and logical thinking, and complex, methodical methods.

Artistic

● Personality Type: Desire to express themselves in a freely open and unsystematic way through various artistic forms.
Do not want to keep appointments and prefer to work “when the mood strikes”.

● Values: Creativity, Originality, The Arts, Unstructured Work

● Work Environments: Unstructured work with few rules (including how they dress) that encourage emotional
expression.

Social

● Personality Type: Want to help people through teaching, counseling, and other social services. Very altruistic and
want to make the world a better place. Have a desire to use social skills and often avoid working with machines.

● Values: Helping Others, Teamwork, Idealism (Political, Religious, etc.)

● Work Environments: Offices that allow people to freely communicate to learn about each other. Organization that
facilitate helping others with career or personal problems.

Enterprising

● Personality Type: Accumulating wealth is important for enterprising people. They enjoy working with others (like
social), but they want to sell to, persuade, or lead/manage people.

● Values: Wealth Attainment, Persuasion, Power

● Work Environments: Places where workers persuade and manage people to gain power and be promoted. Economic
issues (i.e.: making sales quotas, growing the company) can be important.

Conventional

● Personality Type: Love to organize and plan. Like to use clerical and numerical skills to solve straightforward
problems.

● Values: Structure, Organization, stable salary, Control

● Work Environments: Office environments using office software tools for recordkeeping, word processing, copy
machines, and accounting.

Sharf, R. S. (2013). Applying career development theory to counseling (6th ed.). Belmont, CA: Brooks/Cole.