The Philippines have been developing at an incredibly fast pace in recent years, scoring well in the Human Development Index and uncovering new and exciting job opportunities for its residents. The country has a high employment rate of 95.5% and has a very well-developed Information Technology sector.
With this in mind, it is logical to assume that young people (i.e. students) and unemployed people have access to a wide variety of possible jobs. At the same time, when presented with such a choice, it might be hard to reasonably assess oneself and choose a position that corresponds to their certain set of interests, skills, and personal traits.
This is where career guidance and assessment services step in to help people navigate through possible options and choose the most suitable one.
The role and benefits of career guidance and assessment
One should not underestimate the benefits that career guidance services bring:
- Evaluation of strengths and weaknesses
- Identification of interests
- Matching of interests and possible career options
- Identification of the most suitable careers
- Analysis of one’s personality and advice on career choice
Career guidance is especially relevant for young people who do not have real-life working experience and often have absolutely no idea about what they will do in the future.
Thus, it is important to provide assessment services in order to help people find the best career options and strengthen both the community and the country’s economy.
The Secondary School Career Guidance and Counseling Act
In 2019, Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte signed the Secondary School Career Guidance and Counseling Act that is valid for public and private high schools across the country.
The act is aimed at helping students make wiser and more accurate decisions regarding their future careers. To achieve that, the career guidance and counseling program was institutionalized in schools.
The act also imposed the establishment of a National Secondary Schools Career Guidance and Counseling Program (CGCP) to providing high-quality guidance and counseling services to students.
Such a decision standardizes and organizes the career guidance process and places emphasis on its significance. The recognition of the role of such services is great as it proves the government cares about the country residents and is ready to help them make a balanced decision that will lead to satisfaction with the future career.
The Myers–Briggs Type Indicator is one of the world’s most popular methods to assess one’s personality and identify how exactly one makes decisions and perceives the surroundings and people. It analyses whether a person is an introvert or extrovert, thinking or feeling, judging or perceiving, and more to help students understand themselves and their strengths better.
The Fundamental Interpersonal Relations Orientation instruments help people improve their personal relationships by understanding their needs and how those influence their communication and behaviors. It focuses on how you behave around others and how you want others to behave around you in order to provide students a clear emotionally intelligent roadmap for collaboration.
The EQ-i analyzes emotional intelligence. This comprehensive assessment tests five distinct aspects of emotional and social functioning, and then breaks those down further into 15 subscales. Students and career counselors can use these results to learn about leadership potential, team building, and student development, among other things.
The importance of career guidance services in the Philippines
As stated above, career guidance and counseling services bring immense benefits to students. However, if we speak about the Philippines, there are other factors that double the importance of such services in the country.
Lack of involvement from the parents’ side
It is common that parents are the biggest influences when it comes to the career choices made by their children. And this problem is relevant to the Philippines as well.
As the Development Asia outlined, it is necessary to enhance the involvement of parents in the career counseling process and involve them as early as possible so they have enough time to discuss the possible career options with the children.
An important note here: career guidance services should not provide over-complicated information but rather speak in a clear manner that can be understood by anyone. As well, it would be a good idea to provide relevant role models to the students as this can facilitate their decision.
Lack of knowledge about the possible governmental aid
One of the biggest constraints that prevent students from choosing the desired university and hence, occupation, is a poor financial situation. There are many events in the Philippines that might impact one’s financial status: failure of a family business, socioeconomic issues, even extreme and unprecedented weather conditions. All that may seriously affect whether one can afford the desired college.
The financial issue is closely interlinked with another one – a lack of knowledge about the possible governmental financial aid. In the recent survey, only 14% of the respondents were aware of the financial aid program and that means, 86% of the people do not even know the government can help them. Hence, career guidance and counseling services should also inform both the students and their parents about the possible financial aid options, thus, eliminating the bottlenecks in the career selection process.
The availability of career counseling and guidance services in the Philippines is a great indicator of the country’s development process. It showcases that the government is genuinely interested in providing young people with all the tools and information necessary to make a wise and data-driven choice regarding the career that will bring tangible benefits in the future.