Applying Holland's Vocational Choice Theory in Sport Management

Abstract

Holland’s (1997) vocational choice theory is used in vocational counseling to aid job seekers in finding occupations that fit their personality based on Holland’s RIASEC typology of personalities and work environments. The purpose of this research was to determine the Holland RIASEC profiles for occupations within the sport industry by having employees in intercollegiate athletics complete the Position Classification Inventory (Gottfredson & Holland, 1991). Results indicated the three-letter Holland code for the sport industry is SEC. The sport industry is dominated by the Social environment, evidenced by seven occupations possessing Social in the first letter of the profile and Social rating in the top two for all occupations. Seven occupations were primarily Social, three were Realistic, two were Enterprising, and two were Conventional. A MANOVA was also conducted to compare differences between occupational disciplines on the six Holland environments. Implications for sport industry occupations and the application of Holland’s theory are discussed.