John Holland developed the Self-Directed Search (SDS) assessment based on his RIASEC theory that categorizes people and careers into six types: realistic, investigative, artistic, social, enterprising, and conventional. The purpose of the SDS is to match a person's interests and talents to career choices and opportunities by having them complete a questionnaire and receiving a customized report on their top categories. The author scored highest in the social, conventional, and enterprising categories, which aligned with their personality as a teacher who enjoys working with others, numbers, and new ideas. Insights gained included better understanding differences from their spouse and how to use strengths outside of teaching, such as welcoming new church members. The assessment could benefit marriage

1. Self-Directed Search (SDS) Assessment Paper
Morgan Sanders
COUN 534: Fundamentals of Assessment
Spring 2021
Dr. Lauren Coffey

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1. Description of the history and purpose of the SDS
John Holland is the theorist who designed the SDS assessment. He was born in Omaha,
Nebraska, where he also earned a bachelor’s degree in psychology from the Municipal
University of Omaha. He served in the United States Army for four years as a test proctor. He
performed other jobs in the psychological realm. Then in 1953, Holland created the Vocational
Preference Inventory, which helped organize items according to their specific occupation or
listed job. In 1970, Holland published the first version of the SDS and the Occupations Finder.
He created many versions of this assessment because he wanted to perfect it as much as he
possibly could. Finally in 2017, the SDS is published to include standard, student, and veteran
reports so it can meet a wide range of client needs.
John Holland developed the SDS assessment from the RIASEC theory. This theory describes
that people and the environments where they work can be split into six categories: realistic,
investigative, artistic, social, enterprising, and conventional; this is the foundational piece of the
RIASEC theory.
The purpose of the SDS assessment is to match a person’s interests and talents to specific
career choices and educational opportunities that best fit that person. This helps a person
navigate this process because their choices are narrowed down to what they are most interested
in and talented in. The SDS assessment asks questions about a person’s activities, competencies,
and interests. After an individual takes the SDS assessment, they are given a description of each
category listed in the RIASEC theory through a customized report that is generated for only
them. Then, a personalized list of occupations will also be given to the individual so they can see
which potential career fields they should explore further, based on the results of the SDS
assessment.

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2. Summary of your SDS results
The top result I got from the SDS assessment was social. This result makes sense for who I
am because one of my favorite things to do is being around and get to know other people. I am a
teacher and my favorite part about teaching is building relationships with my students and
getting to know them more. When I am having a rough day in my personal life, my professional
life can make it a lot better because I am around people all day. Sometimes this is hard because I
am constantly being asked how I am doing. However, it is wonderful to have the opportunity to
help students learn and grow, even when I am not feeling the best or completely happy. My job
as a teacher helps me be social and work with others in an extremely positive and encouraging
way.
I also know this result is true because of how I recharge and gain more energy throughout the
day. I am a true extrovert and I struggle to have energy and motivation when I am by myself. An
example of this can be told from my freshman year of college. I was working as a Resident
Assistant in the residence halls, and I had a whole room to myself. This was one of the hardest
semesters of college for me because I was alone quite often. I was extremely lonely and felt like
I was isolated from my community. I am highly social and love to be around others whenever I
can.
The second highest result I had from the SDS assessment was conventional. At first, I was
extremely intrigued as to what this result specially meant for me and who I am as an individual.
Then, I looked at the explanation for conventional and it says that conventional people tend to
like to work with papers and numbers. After reading this, the result of conventional was clear to
me, since I am a high school math teacher. I love working with students and teaching them the

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value of knowing and understanding how to work with numbers. This is a highly practical skill
that they will be able to take with them for the rest of their lives.
Another reason why it makes sense that I scored high in the conventional section is because I
worked in an office setting in college and I loved it. I enjoyed answering the phone and doing
paperwork for the company. It was an extremely satisfying job because it was easy for me to
accomplish tasks that my manager would ask me to do. I also really enjoyed the colleagues I
worked with in the office and built good friendships with them. Additionally, I enjoyed helping
the customers who would come in and ask questions. I worked in an office that was in the
Admissions department at my university, so there would be many questions about the admissions
process and how it all works. I found answering customers’ questions about the university fun
and exciting because I remembered how nervous I was about the whole college process. I think it
is highly important and beneficial for office staff to be friendly and approachable.
The third area where I scored the highest for the SDS assessment is the enterprising category.
This was an interesting result because I have never thought about myself as the enterprising type.
However, the description of this category says that people in the enterprising category generally
like to work with people and ideas more than things. I absolutely love working with people and
learning new things and ideas from my colleagues. I am about to finish my second year of
teaching high school and I have learned a great deal from my colleagues. I attend meetings every
week where we discuss the curriculum that is being taught in our different classes and how to
best instruct our classes through this material. I think everyone should take professional
development seriously because we have so much to learn from the people around us. I have
always lived by the quote, “You are the average of the five people you hang around.” I think this
quote makes sense as to why I am an enterpriser because I am careful with who I learn from.

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3. Insights learned from completion of the assessment.
One major insight I gained from completing this assessment was having my husband also
take it to see where he scored the highest. I thought it was interesting to see how we scored the
highest in different categories. He scored the highest in the realistic and artistic categories, which
were my lowest categories that I scored in. This was interesting to talk to him about because we
discussed how we both challenge each other to grow in the areas where we are weakest. My
husband is a contractor and likes to work with his hands; however, I do not enjoy this kind of
work. But he has shown me how important it is to know how to fix various parts of the house
and get out of my comfort zone. After we both took this assessment, it helps us grow in our
marriage because I believe we understand each other in a deeper way, and we work better
together.
Another insight learned from working through this assessment is how I can use my strengths
to help others in ways outside of teaching. I have been in the zone of teaching for about two
years now, and it can be challenging to think of my skills and talents outside of my career. I have
been trying to think of ways that I could use my skills outside of teaching and this assessment
reminding me that one of my greatest skills is being able to build a relationship with other
people. I would like to use this skill at my local church so that I can help new members of the
church feel welcome when they come to church the first time. I would also like to use this skill to
help the current members of the church get plugged in and build a community with one another.
Additionally, I think it would be great to use the social skill to help my students find a club or
organization where they feel like they belong and can be involved. This would be beneficial
because some students do not know where they belong or what group of people they would get
along with the best. Therefore, I would love to help students discover themselves more.

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4. How you can use this assessment with clients
I believe this assessment could be used in a beneficial way with marital counseling. I think
one of the greatest weaknesses of a marriage is the couple not knowing each other’s strengths
and weaknesses in-depth like they should. This can be detrimental to a marriage because
knowing the strengths and weaknesses of your spouse can help you know what ways you need to
step up and help, or what ways you can sit back and watch your spouse flourish and grow in
what they love. Therefore, it could be a great point in marital counseling for a counselor to have
both partners in a marriage work through the assessment individually, then discuss the results
with each other and the counselor.
Another great way to use this assessment would be for someone who is young and who is
trying to discover themselves. I think it would be great for a high school junior or senior aged
student to take this assessment to see where their strengths are before they decide what their next
steps are after graduating from high school. Many young people do not know their strengths or
areas where they will flourish, so this is a great way for them to discover themselves and see
where they might excel the most.
An additional way to use this assessment with a client would be with a middle-aged person
who might be going through a mid-life crisis. A person changes a great deal between high school
and their middle age, so it would be highly beneficial for them to discover how their passions
and skills have changed over the course of their adulthood. As people get married and have
children and grow in their careers, they learn so much more about who they are, and they could
change from who they thought they were before. This is important for a counselor to understand
as they begin working with clients. Many clients may try to hold on to who they used to be when
they were younger, rather than moving on from these ideas and growing into a new person.

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References
American Psychologist staff (2008). Award for distinguished scientific applications of
psychology: John L. Holland. American Psychologist, 63, 672-674.
Bhandari, B., Chopra, D., & Singh, K. (2020). Self-Directed Learning: Assessment of Students’
Abilities and Their Perspective. Advances in Physiology Education, 44(3), 383–386.
Dozier, V. C., Sampson, J. P., & Reardon, R. C. (2013). Using Two Different Self-Directed
Search (SDS) Interpretive Materials: Implications for Career Assessment. Professional
Counselor, 3(2), 67–72.
Gottfredson, G. D. (1999). John L. Holland’s contributions to vocational psychology: A review
and evaluation. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 55, 15-40.