What is the Social career type?

The Social career type describes people who are most interested in helping, teaching, advising or caring for others. If you lean this way, you tend to feel most engaged when your work makes a direct difference to someone. It often suits teaching, health care, social work, counselling, coaching, community work and people-focused roles in many organisations.

Don't confuse this with being sociable. The Social type is about wanting to help people grow or feel better. Some of the most devoted teachers and counsellors are quiet and would much rather have one real conversation than attend a party. Social is one of six types in John Holland's RIASEC model, and it sits next to Artistic and Enterprising on the hexagon, opposite Realistic.

What Social interests tend to look like

You might recognise some of these:

• People tell you things, sometimes on the bus.
• You feel a real lift when someone finally understands something you explained.
• You notice who's been left out, and do something about it.
• You'd swap a higher salary for work that feels as if it matters to someone.
• You enjoy explaining, mentoring or looking after people more than managing things.
• Spreadsheets feel abstract until you know who they're for.

How Social interests show up

At work

Typical fields include teaching at all levels, nursing, allied health, social work, counselling, human resources, training and community services. You tend to do best when you've got direct contact with the people you help and when you can see the results of your efforts over time.

The trap is that caring roles often ask for more than you've got. You may find yourself staying late, taking on one more person, or carrying someone else's problems home. Over time that takes a real toll. It's worth setting up rituals that mark the end of your workday, finding colleagues who understand and keeping a clear sense of what is and isn't your job. In organisations, it can also be easy for this work to go unnoticed, so keep track of the results you helped bring about.

In love

You probably put a lot into your relationships, and you're likely to be attentive, supportive and quick to notice when something's off. The watch-out is carrying on being the helper at home, so that your partner feels a bit like a client, or you never get cared for yourself. If you spend all day listening, it's fine to say, "I've got nothing left tonight, can we talk tomorrow?" It's also worth letting your partner look after you sometimes, even if that feels strange. People who tend to accommodate others can find this especially hard.

With friends

You're probably the friend people call in a crisis, and that's a compliment. You might also be the person who keeps the group connected. The risk is one-way friendships, where you're always the listener. Notice who asks how you are. Keep those people close. It's okay to say, "I don't have the capacity for this right now, but I care and I'll call you on Sunday."

Strengths and watch-outs

The strengths include empathy, patience, an ability to explain things clearly and a real talent for bringing out the best in people. Teams with you on them often feel better to be part of.

The watch-outs are mostly about limits:

1. Give from a full tank. Rest and interests outside work aren't a treat in these jobs. They're part of doing the work well.
2. Separate helping from fixing. You can care a lot and still accept that some problems aren't yours to solve.
3. Learn to have hard conversations. Caring people may avoid giving honest feedback, and that doesn't help anyone in the long run. Read about the avoiding conflict style if this sounds like you.
4. Know your worth. Wanting fair pay doesn't make you less caring.

How to work with someone high or low in Social interests

Someone with strong Social interests

• Show them how their work helps real people.
• Include them in decisions affecting people. They may see consequences others miss.
• Watch out for overload, and take things off their plate before they ask.
• Ask them to mentor others, and recognise that as real work.

Someone with few Social interests

• Don't assume they're cold. They may care deeply, and show it by solving problems or building things.
• Explain the human impact, but don't require them to enjoy the people side of every task.
• Give them clear, limited people tasks instead of open-ended ones.
• Value how they keep an objective eye on a situation when everyone else is emotional.

Research notes

• Personality overlap. Larson, Rottinghaus and Borgen (2002) reported links between Social interests and both extraversion (about .31) and agreeableness (about .19). So many Social types are outgoing and warm, but neither is a requirement, and these correlations are moderate at best. Quiet helpers are common.
• Differences between groups. Su, Rounds and Armstrong (2009) found that women on average reported stronger Social interests than men, with a medium-to-large difference (d = -0.68). Many men have strong Social interests, of course, and do excellent work in these fields. These are average differences, and they can vary depending on how the questions are written.
• Why interests matter at work. Van Iddekinge and colleagues (2011) found in a meta-analysis that interests may hold more promise for predicting job performance and turnover than many researchers had assumed. This was especially true when an interest measure was relevant to a particular job. So wanting to help people may be useful information when choosing a role, rather than just a nice sentiment.
• Emotion skills matter in some roles. Joseph and Newman (2010) found that ability-based emotional intelligence was positively related to performance in jobs with high emotional labour, and negatively in jobs low in it. Many Social jobs involve a lot of emotional labour, so these skills may matter more there.

The U.S. O*NET database lists jobs for this interest area, centred on helping, teaching, advising and caring for others. Keep in mind that its details reflect the American job market, so check local requirements too, particularly for registered professions.

Find your direction

Wanting to help can take you in many directions, from the classroom to a hospital ward to running a community organisation. Your other interests help narrow it down. Take the Career Compass Expedition to see how you score across all six types. It takes about seven minutes and uses Selfcarta's own questions, which haven't yet been independently validated. You could also talk through the results with someone who knows you well.