1Introduction
B
efore we get started fi nding the best jobs for your personality type, here are a few things
to know about the information in this book and how it is organized.Where the Information Comes From
! e information we used in creating this book comes from three major government sources:
!! e U.S. Department of Labor: We used several data sources to construct the
information we put into this book. We started with the jobs included in the U.S.
Department of Labor’s O*NET database.! e O*NET includes information on about
950 occupations and is now the primary source of detailed information on occupations.
One of the information topics the O*NET covers is the personality types that are
discussed in this book.! e Labor Department updates the O*NET on a regular basis,
and we used the most recent one available, release 13. As it happens, in release 13 the
data about personality types has been completely revised and updated. Because we also
wanted to include earnings, growth, and number of openings—information not included
in the O*NET—we used sources at the U.S. Department of Labor’s Bureau of Labor
Statistics (BLS).! e Occupational Employment Statistics survey provided the most
reliable fi gures on earnings we could obtain, and the Employment Projections program
provided the nation’s best fi gures on job growth and openings.! ese two BLS programs
use a slightly diff erent system of job titles than the O*NET does, but we were able to link
the BLS data to most of the O*NET job titles we used to develop this book.
!! e U.S. Census Bureau: Data on the demographic characteristics of workers came
from the Current Population Survey (CPS), conducted by the U.S. Census Bureau.! is
includes our information about the proportion of workers in each job who are men and
women, are self-employed, or work part time. As with the BLS data, we had to match
slightly diff erent sets of job titles, but we were able to identify CPS data for almost all the
O*NET jobs.
!! e U.S. Department of Education: We used the Classifi cation of Instructional
Programs, a system developed by the U.S. Department of Education, to cross-reference
the educational or training programs related to each job.