Vaid’s Verdict: An entertaining and remarkably accurate way of figuring out what you should be when you ‘grow up’…and yes, it works on us so called ‘adults’ who think we have it all figured out too.

What did I want to be when I grew up? A cartoonist. A writer. A travel show host. An environmentalist even! (Quell the guffaws please) My generation has had too many choices. Being a ‘Smith’ didn’t mean we’d have to work with metal, being female didn’t mean we’d have to be human incubators, and even being ethnic didn’t involve a future in taxis and convenience stores. Gender, race, religion, oddly-shaped legs – nothing can come between us and our dream careers. Except, when you can do *anything*, chances are as humans, we’ll do *nothing*. Which is why we invest in a plethora of self-help books, career counselors and my personal favorite, ‘trial and error’ to guide us to the right career choice. But what if a 10 min quiz could dispense of the counseling interviews and experimental crêpe spinning to reveal what you should be doing for the rest of your life?

Career Match boasts a ten minute quiz that will “change your life” in just such a way. Admittedly, quizzes make me positively tingle, so I was just happy to check boxes and tally up scores. But what this quiz reveals is a lot better than your kissing style or which Sex & the City character you are. This one is actually useful. Shoya Zichy, author of Career Match separates the human race into four personality types – Reds, Blues, Greens and Golds. Armed with your personality type you can learn what jobs best suit you, what work environment is most conducive to you actually doing any work, and how to deal with the boss you hate.

This isn’t new age hocus pocus – From Aristotle’s four ‘humors’ in 400 B.C. to Jung’s four ‘functions’ in 1920, personality typing has had many years to be perfected. And in the 1950’s a man named David Keirsey overlaid the four ‘humors’ onto the Jungian/Myers-Briggs models (MBTI is the world’s most recognized personality typing system) to create the Color Q system. So all the Reds who cringe at self-help books, just remember that the reason Color Q is so successful is that it’s backed by hundreds of years of research and millions of people tested that prove their theories correct. (Yes, my secondary color is Red)

I wouldn’t say that this book can change your life, unless you have absolutely no clue what you want to do in life. If that’s the case then yes, it can. It’ll list 50 different careers that could potentially be the right path for you and it’ll even tell you which career fields are growing, which have the highest salary average and tips on researching your dream job. Based on your color type, these predictions should be fairly accurate. Now, if you already know that you’d rather be an acrobat than an accountant, this book will confirm your suspicions about yourself. Yes, you come across as passive aggressive. And no, you’re not fooling anyone with that hand sanitizer, we’ve all seen crumbs in your keyboard.

Just to be sure, I tested the Color Q system on the most anti-quiz/self-help person I know. And even with him, let’s call him Growly, the test was spot on. His current career was reflected in the list of suggested jobs for his personality type, along with the position he’d like in 10 years time. Certainly makes sense if you know him but for a ten minute quiz to reveal it is impressive.

So if you’re a grown up without a clue, or you’re considering a change of cubicles, pick up Career Match. It’s easy to read, surprisingly accurate and best of all, actually useful. And for the price it’d be a pretty fun party trick too. (Blues and Golds won’t think so but they’re a bit stuffy anyway)

About the Author:

Shoya Zichy, MA Ed. is a New York-City based career coach, seminar leader and adjunct lecturer at New York University. Her work has been featured in Fortune, Newsday, Barron’s, the Chicago Sun-Times, the Washington Post and on CNN. Her clients include ABN AMRO, Deloitte & Touche, Merrill Lynch, Prudential, UBS & the US Treasury. Shoya is also the author of Women and The Leadership Q. For information see www.ColorQProfiles.com.

Here’s a glimpse of the book: