ACT’s JobPro Database Helps Advance America’s Workforce

ACT takes its role in the development of America’s workforce seriously. It created the WorkKeys system before the current skilled worker shortage, before baby boomers started retiring in droves, and before globalization redefined the U.S. economy.

Today, the system includes one of the largest specific-skill databases in existence. ACT has completed more than 15,000 detailed job profiles as part of its ongoing workforce development initiative. Staff add new profiles regularly to provide a continuously updated review of the task and skill requirements of America’s jobs.

Created over a 15-year period, the job profiles reside in ACT’s JobPro Database. This repository also houses background information on the companies represented in the profiles. “The volume of data on America’s jobs in this database is substantial,” said Oliver Cummings, assistant vice president, WorkKeys Development. “While each profile is particular to a given company and how the company uniquely defines the job, this broad representation of a cross-section of America’s jobs lets us look at what is important about what people do in jobs in general, and what skills really play significant roles in individual success.”

Cummings and his staff recently completed a study of jobs, companies, and industries represented in the database. They reviewed additions to the database over a two-year period—more than 3,000 profiles. These profiles cover about 40 percent of the occupations in the U.S. Department of Labor’s O*NET (Occupational Information Network) database.

The O*NET database describes occupations in terms of the skills and knowledge required, how the work is performed, and typical work settings. It covers more than 900 occupations in 23 job families. The ACT database covers all 22 of the civilian job families in this classification system; only the military-specific occupations are not covered.

Recent additions to the ACT database were made in all 22 of the civilian job families. These additions included:

• More than 95 percent of the Production occupations
• Over two-thirds of the Management occupations
• Half or more of the Office and Administrative Support; Installation, Maintenance, and Repair; Sales and Related; Food Preparation and Serving; and Building and Grounds Cleaning and Maintenance occupations
• About one-third of the Construction and Extraction; and Farming, Fishing, and Forestry occupations

The organizations and companies represented in ACT’s database range from government agencies that report no revenue, to small companies that produce revenue in the hundreds of thousands of dollars, to very large, multibillion-dollar global organizations.

The power of the database lies in its future use, said Cummings. ACT has begun to tap the information to identify potential new solutions to America’s workforce crisis.

“As we continue to build our knowledge base about work in America, we will be able to develop new solutions to enhance an individual’s work life.”

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