This article published in Career College Central Magazine discusses the need to re-think the delivery of career services in higher education and in career colleges specifically. It criticizes the Placement model discussing the origins of the model and why schools must evolve to meet the needs of the 21st century.

1. MAY 2013 | 18
robert starks jr
“Trying to place an evolving
person into the changing
work environment .... is like
trying to hit a butterfly with a
boomerang.”
– Mitchell Krumboltz (1996)
The 21st century is characterized by an accelerated pace of
change, rapid technological advancement and an increasingly
connected world. These dynamics have transformed the labor
market and required career seekers to evolve with it. The skills
one needs to successfully find and secure employment as well
as manage, advance and transition one’s career are different for
the 21st century workforce, yet many career colleges still use a
career services delivery model from the 19th century.
According to the Council for the Advancement of Standards
in Higher Education (2010), placement assistance began in the
19th century when commercial employment agencies began to
place graduates of the nation’s teacher training programs into
jobs. Placement models aligned with the needs of the time
because they were established when small graduate cohorts were
entering a stable economy with little to no global competition.
Furthermore, jobs typically had linear career paths and were
expected to span one’s lifetime. Moreover, most jobs created in
the agricultural and industrial economies required unskilled or
semi-skilled labor. In addition to the realities of the 19th century
economy, the placement approach was also influenced by early
developing career theory.
By Robert Starks Jr., MaxKnowledge Inc.
Transforming the
way career colleges
deliver career
services.
The concept of placement is rooted in the trait-and-factor theory of
occupational choice developed in the early 1900s by Frank Parsons,
the father of vocational guidance. The trait-and-factor theory is
one among a group of theories referred to as matching theories.
Trait-and-factor theory assumes that vocational guidance is a
rational decision-making process requiring an expert practitioner
(e.g., career adviser) to evaluate candidates’ traits and match them
to a best-fit job in the labor market. This approach to vocational
guidance continues to dominate the delivery of career services in
higher education institutions. Trait-and-factor theory still has value
and relevance, but it assumes a level of stability in both the work
environment and the individual career seeker. Moreover, due to its
focus on identifying existing traits, the theory does little to address
the development of skills necessary for successfully securing
employment over the lifetime of a career seeker. Finally, because
it necessitates an expert practitioner to conduct extensive trait
evaluations, scalability is problematic, particularly with the advent
of online education. Today’s professional environment is drastically
different and continues to evolve at a rapid pace.
The
Evolution
of Career
Services

2. Subscribe at www.CareerCollegeCentral.com | 19
Increased access to education has contributed to larger graduate
cohorts widely dispersed across the globe. Globalization has
made economies interdependent and has increased competition
in the job market. Stability is no longer the norm for the modern
workforce; the average person today is likely to have several
jobs in his or her lifetime and change careers multiple times.
Moreover, there is a rising trend of freelancing, contract work
and self-employment, resulting in individuals having multiple
“gigs” to pay the bills. Our very concept of work has changed.
The idea of a job being a one-time, logical decision that
continues into the rest of our lives is no longer true. If everything
is so drastically different, why are we not witnessing disruptive
innovation in the way career colleges approach the delivery of
career services?
The 19th century placement model is outdated in a 21st
century economy. Beyond the fact that placement is simply
an inaccurate and antiquated term for what career services
professionals do, it perpetuates the fallacy that a career is the
outcome of a linear process. In today’s fast-paced, changing
work environment, career seekers must be agile, self-sufficient
and comfortable navigating through a complex, evolving job
search and career management process to achieve their career
goals. Additionally, success is not only determined by career
seekers’ soft skills, technical skills or experience, but also by
their employability skills – skills necessary for obtaining and
keeping a job, making job and career changes, and successfully
seeking career advancement. Career colleges obviously realize
this and work hard to address these necessary skills, but most do
so with a career services delivery model primarily designed as a
secondary service. Why is this so?
In an article previously published in Career College Central
entitled “Mind the Gap,” a quote was included from a 2012 press
release by David J. Pauldine, President of DeVry University.
“It is clear to us that effectively educating today’s workforce
requires market-driven curricula that provide students with
requisite hard and technical skills, as well as a competent level
of hands-on experience prior to graduation,” Pauldine said.
Although this assertion is valid, employability skills are
a missing component because they are often viewed as
“extracurricular” or not as critical as technical or soft skills. This
explains why, at most institutions, students must voluntarily
choose to participate in career services outside of the classroom
to develop the necessary employability skills for career success.
There is general agreement that employability skills are critical
to student success, yet they are typically absent or curtailed
from curricula. Why are these skills typically missing from
curricula, and why are the services provided by the career center
not required at most institutions?
Career colleges have an incredible opportunity to rethink the
way they deliver career services. The days of referring to career
services as the back end of the career college environment
must end. This thinking is driven by tradition, not the market.
How can the process of vocational guidance start during the
admissions process? How can employability skills be embedded
into existing curricula, and how can they be a significant part of
the design of new educational programs? These are but a few of
the questions we need to address in order to reshape the way we
deliver career services.
Exemplary career development systems must be woven into the
fabric of an institution rather than designed as a supplemental
service outside of the classroom. Based in systems thinking,
we must examine the complex structures and behaviors of our
institutions to fully understand the interdependent relationships
among institutional infrastructure, students' career readiness and
graduate employment rates. If we commit ourselves to gaining a
better understanding of how we can improve the design of our
career services delivery models, our students, their parents, our
employers, our communities and our institutions will all benefit.
Exemplary career
development
systems must
be woven into
the fabric of an
institution, rather
than designed as a
supplemental
service outside of
the classroom.
Robert Starks Jr. is the Vice President of Learning
Initiatives for MaxKnowledge Inc., the leading employee
training company for the career college sector of
higher education. His experience in career services,
alumni relations and community outreach in the career
education sector earned him four Best Practice Awards
from the Arizona Private School Association. Starks
earned his Master of Science in Management from
Colorado Technical University and his undergraduate degree in Marketing
from Arizona State University. He is the Director of Media and Technology
for the Arizona Career Development Association (ACDA) and the Founder
of CareerTipster.com. Robert can be found on Twitter @robertstarksjr and
contacted at roberts@maxknowledge.com.