CareerLeader—developed by HBS Senior Fellow Dr. Timothy Butler and his cofounder Dr. James Waldroop—is an interactive tool that can help you identify your interests, values and abilities and match them with career opportunities. To maximize the effectiveness of this tool, we recommend you set up a Career Coaching appointment to review your results with one of our Career Coaches.

CareerLeader is available to HBS alumni free of charge. Request Access →

You may also wish to explore the Peak Experiences Exercise to help with your reflection.

As you embark on your job search, we recommend you create your Career and Life Criteria early in the process. Career and Life Criteria are single clear concepts that hold meaning and can be a pillar for moving your life and work forward. They are important aspects of work or life that need to be attended to, in order to feel fulfilled and truly successful.

Career criteria create focus and clarity. When you have an explicit awareness of your own career criteria, you know what to look for in multiple alternative career paths. You can evaluate any job offer against this list of essential career identity elements. Check out some Career and Life Criteria examples.

As you read them, you might begin to reflect on what your own criteria may be. You may want to begin filling out your own Career and Life Criteria worksheet. It might be helpful to have some stimuli that generate ideas for your criteria. This Key Job Search worksheet might be helpful to generate ideas. We recommend reviewing your Career and Life Criteria with a coach.