Hello Roy, My name is XXXXXX. I (along with my co-worker, XXXXX) attended the FCE course in Las Vegas through Roy Matheson and Associates back in February of this year. Our facility has finally obtained the Roy Matheson FCE software and the various equipment that we need to do the FCE's. We are having a couple of issues that we wondered if you could help us out with. First of all, we obtained the "Dictionary of Occupational Titles with O*NET Definitions." We are going to do our first FCE in 2 weeks on an LPN that works here at our hospital. We found the LPN job description in section 29-2061.00 of the DOT. However, we expected to find specific requirements (i.e. frequent, occasional, etc etc with weights listed for lifting, pushing/pulling, etc etc). None of these were listed in our DOT. Are they supposed to be listed in the DOT? If not, can I find these online? Did we buy the wrong books? I appreciate your time and efforts in helping us with these problems that we are having.Thanks, (name withheld)

response:Hi, XXXXX! The books you bought are OK as far as they go. The one you are missing is titled 'The Transitional Classification of Jobs'. It can be purchased from Athens Press. They are on the web...if you don't find them, let me know. The other name for this book (the original name) is 'Selected Characteristics of Jobs' or later 'The classification of Jobs'. The information in these two books is exactly the same; the title was changed for commerical purposes.

If you have the WorkStation software, both the DOT and the Classification of Jobs is in it. You actually don't need the books other than for a paper reference.

To see the information in the WorkStation go to Button 2 Intake, then the Job tab. (I am doing this from memory and may miss a step or name.) Click on DOT tab. Click on Find (look to the right side of the screen).

Once you are in Find, you have a couple of choices. If I know the exact name of the job I enter the first word in 'Type Ahead'. But you have to spell the name correctly and you can't have any spaces. For example
'Nurses Aid' will not come up because of the 's' in Nurses and because of the space between Nurses and Aid. So enter Nurse and see what happens. (I sometimes type slowly so that database has a chance to guide
me).

The second option is to us 'Key Words'. This search allows you a little latitude if you do not know the exact name of the job. For example, putting in 'nurse' will give you a couple of dozen responses, but then
you have to narrow those down. But put in the word 'practical' and you get a few choices (as I recall). So, if I know an important word in the title but do not know how the words are combined in the data base, I start with a Key Word search on the important word and go from there.

Once you find the job description you want, be sure to click on PDL and then update the job demands (the button at the bottom of the screen). Then look at the next tab, Job Demands. If you look further than the Strength and Mobility tabs you will begin to see the demands that are NOT in the DOT...

Please feel free to contact me with ANY questions about this or other issues. If this is your first FCE or your first use of the software, please let me assist as I can. For example, have you loaded the Phrase libraries?
Be well! Roy Matheson