Have you been thinking that maybe now is the time to change careers but you weren’t sure where to look to know if it would be a good move? Or maybe you want to stay in your current industry but still want to know what the future of that industry will be? You know that there are so many sites on in the Internet that you could look at to get the answers to your questions. But then the question becomes – how reliable are they? I don’t know about you but I have always gone to the Department of the Labor’s Occupational Handbook site (http://www.bls.gov/oco/).
If you have never looked at the handbook before – it has a wealth of information. Take the time to peruse it before you seriously consider a career change. Okay… so let’s take a look at an occupation and see what the handbook has to say. Let’s say that you have been thinking about a job in the community and social services area. Maybe you were thinking about becoming a counselor? You would go to the site, click on Services and then find community and social services – counselor. Click on it and it will open up to a page that gives you the options to look at the nature of the work, training/qualification, employment, job outlook, projection, earning, wages and related occupations. Everything you might want to know about becoming a counselor.
You can scroll down the page and read about counselors. Then you find out that there are different types of counselors such as educational, vocational, school, rehabilitation, mental health, substance abuse and marriage and family. Wow… more decisions but at least by reading it you will have a better handle on the different options and can find the right fit for you.
As you scroll down you can read about work environment and employment and then you see the job outlook. The government expects this occupation to grow by 18% between two years ago and 2018. Then if you read on, you can see that substance abuse and behavioral counselors will be in even greater demand at 21%.
Continuing down the page you can read about the earnings for this occupation as well. The range appears to be from $57800 at the top down to $25950 at the bottom – depending upon the industry and your locale.
Bear in mind that this is just an overview to help you understand the occupation, what is required, the job outlook and what you can expect. Different areas will have different requirements and salaries will be based upon the local cost of living – in most cases. But if this is something that is up your alley, becoming a counselor could pay off in greater dividend s than just salary.
So take the time to review the handbook. Read up on the latest industry information and maybe you will find yourself in a new career!
By: Nancy Anderson, Staff Writer
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