Our approach

Problem

Day after day, worldwide demand for digital skills increases. Businesses actively seek to fill digital technology jobs in order to keep up with the competition and prepare for the future. However, most of them are struggling to find suitable candidates. According to the European Commision, around 500,000 digital jobs across the European Union will remain unfilled by 2020¹. This is an alarming fact considering levels of youth unemployment not only in the EU but across the world. According to the International Labour Organization (ILO), more than 200 million young people are either unemployed or have a job but live in poverty². This estimation is supported by a recent major international public opinion survey (The State of iGen) conducted among young adults (aged 18-24) which confirms that young people are concerned about making their future career decision³. These results show that more than two-thirds (67%) of young people said they had received insufficient or no careers advice at any point in their education or since leaving school or university. Moreover, only 15% said the careers advice they had received included more future-focused, digital jobs, 38% felt the advice they had received was focused purely on traditional non-digital roles and 22% said the careers advice they received was “out-of-date”. Not surprisingly then, more than one-fifth (23%) of study participants appear to have lost all confidence and worry they do not have the skills to take on any role, no matter how basic.

These findings struck us and we began to search for the root cause of this massive problem. Eventually, we’ve come to a conclusion that although more and more people try to proactively learn these modern digital roles, only a few succeed. Ultimately, we’ve identified that young people and others are discouraged from learning digital skills due to these 3 hurdles:

“What should I choose?”

We all have different skills and personalities, strengths and weaknesses. And just like a fish can’t climb a tree, people should never be forced to pick a career they don’t fit. Without access to relevant information about the current job market and a massive potential of a digital economy, young people are left to believe there is only a handful of options available to them.

“Where should I start?”

There is a ton of content available but barely any structure to it. While those at universities can follow a detailed curriculum, others are expected to search through dozens of pages only to find expensive and often outdated information. You must first start with a foundation before you build the rest of the house. That’s why young people need a great blueprint - a detailed plan guiding them through the process of learning new digital skills.

“How do I get any experience?”

Most businesses require prior experience to even consider a candidate for a job. Consequently, young people struggle to prepare themselves for the real world without opportunities to build an attractive portfolio.

Solution

After we’ve analyzed the relevant information we’ve come to a conclusion that young people need an experienced mentor who can help them succeed in the digital market. We believe Komoio is going to help navigate people from the beginning of their digital career until they become professionals. Our mission is to help people recognize their talents, learn popular digital skills and encourage them to start freelancing or get employed in the digital industry. We want to help people overcome the hurdles inherent to starting a digital career with the following 3 steps:

1. Digital Career Test

A Digital Career Test allows us to gain deeper insight into your personality and skills. We believe that because of its stability, personality is one of the most important factors you should consider when making a career choice. This approach is inspired by a world-renowned person-environment theory of John Holland. We chose this method because it is the dominant model of vocational psychology and an industry standard for over 60 years now. According to Holland, people and work environments can be categorized using six types: Realistic, Investigative, Artistic, Social, Enterprising, and Conventional, with a collective shorthand of RIASEC. The result of the test is a career personality type which is meant to inspire your personal growth and provide an improved understanding of your personality in the context of making a career decision.

2. Structured & customized study plan

You’ve set your goals - but do you know how to achieve them? That’s why after matching you with the relevant jobs you will receive a personalized study plan tailored to your specific needs. We plan to launch this feature in the near future but in the meantime, we can already recommend you a list of courses and other material to get you started.

3. Training grounds

And, finally, we plan to include practice examples into the customized learning plan to enable you start building your own, professional portfolio. This way you can earn necessary experience and gain more confidence in your skills at the same time.

What can you expect now?

At the moment, you can take the Digital Career Test, matching you with the most suitable digital jobs. After, you will be recommended specific online courses to kickstart your digital career.

While getting feedback on the test and constantly improving it, we are working hard on the personalized plan and practice examples. We can’t wait for you to try them and hopefully find a perfect, future-proof job.

Our testing model

When designing our testing model we were inspired by one of the most prominent theories in vocational psychology (Holland’s theory) and applied it to an area of a digital career counseling. Just like Holland did, we’ve also focused on a “congruence” construct in developing our own model.

Holland (1997) defines congruence as the compatibility of the individual’s resemblance to a type of work or the environment in which that individual finds her or himself⁴. Simply, congruence is a match between a personality and a career choice.

Many studies show that a fit between a personality and a working environment has been proved to produce positive working outcomes, including:

1. reduced job stress, strain and anxiety
2. improved physical health, psychological health and emotional stability
3. increased creativity, motivation, performance, job success & satisfaction

Moreover, Holland’s theory is widely accepted and globally valid in explaining individual differences in personality, and so provides a strong base both for gaining data and providing an appealing user experience.

Test results

Our test aims to explore the test taker’s character through a series of 27 carefully crafted questions, showing career personality profile results accompanied by a Holland’s code consisting of three letters from the R-I-A-S-E-C framework. More importantly, we are matching the test taker’s personality results with the most suitable digital jobs and recommending relevant online courses to kickstart a fitting digital career.

Questions’ Design

Although we use the basic concept of the Holland’s theory, we’ve decided to change the test questions to better reflect modern times.

The test describes personality on six dimensions (Realistic, Investigative, Artistic, Social, Enterprising, Conventional). Every dimension was designed to facilitate understanding of specific personality traits, skills and abilities. Each dimension is measured with six questions.

The test consists of 27 items (questions). For the measurement of our dimensions we are using both nominal and interval scales. Nominal-level measurement is used with two dichotomous categories. In cases where quality of traits, skills and abilities could be quantified, we’ve decided on using an interval scale where the questions and quotes are arranged on a six point scale. The variables usually range from “Not at all” to “Absolutely”.

In the process of item creation, we have focused on designing attractive questions with simple yet insightful answers. For concepts that are easy to express in images, our test gives an opportunity to answer visually. For concepts which are too abstract or too specific, we are using text-based possibilities to answer. Since we refused to compromise on accuracy, we are constantly having to balance between the type of questions and the test’s length.

Why take this test?

In overall, making a career decision is hard - but we can help. Our digital career test, based on the person-environment theory created by a world-renowned psychologist John Holland, helps you match your skills and personality with future-focused, digital jobs. The other benefits include a person-centered approach, insightful results and relevant study material recommendations.

No more outdated careers advice - welcome to the 21st. century.