Advise students on academic or career matters
Part of the output can be produced by software today.
Software drafts well and sends at volume, and vertical support agents now resolve a large share of inbound questions end to end. What does not transfer is the relationship, and the judgment about when a message should not be sent at all.
| How automatable | Partly automatable |
|---|---|
| Kind of work | Routine communication and explanation |
| Jobs that do it | 52 occupations |
| Tool categories that apply | Vertical agents, Builders |
| O*NET activity | Providing Consultation and Advice to Others (4.A.4.b.6) |
What this looks like on the job
Not our paraphrase. These are real task statements recorded against this activity, spread across the 52 occupations that perform it.
- Review student misconduct reports requiring disciplinary action, and counsel students regarding such reports.
- Mentor graduate students and junior colleagues.
- Advise political science students.
- Maintain student attendance records, grades, and other required records.
- Maintain regularly scheduled office hours to advise and assist students.
- Advise students on academic and vocational curricula and on career issues.
- Advise students on academic and vocational curricula, career issues, and laboratory and field research.
- Advise students on course selection, career decisions, and other academic and vocational concerns.
- Guide and counsel students with adjustment or academic problems or special academic interests.
- Guide and counsel students with adjustment or academic problems or with special academic interests.
- Guide and counsel students with adjustments, academic problems, or special academic interests.
- Guide or counsel students with adjustment problems, academic problems, or special academic interests.
- Counsel students with adjustment or academic problems.
- Research or recommend textbooks, software, equipment, or other learning materials to complement tutoring.
- Advise and teach students.
- Inform students of the procedures for completing and submitting class work, such as lab reports.
- Provide information, guidance, and preparation for the General Equivalency Diploma (GED) examination.
- Advise students on academic and vocational curricula and career issues.
What we would actually use
One recommendation rather than a shortlist, because a shortlist is just your problem handed back. This is what we would buy for routine communication and explanation, and what it costs.
Drafting replies costs nothing beyond the assistant you already pay for. Only move to a support agent billed per resolution once the inbound volume is large enough that the per-resolution price beats the hour it takes you.
Chosen for the cheapest thing that does the job, not the best funded. Nothing on this site is sponsored, and the full landscape is there when you want to disagree with us.
The rest of the category
Context, not alternatives to weigh up. We name the layer rather than promise a named product does your specific task.
Matched from the kind of work, not from vendor marketing. Check any of them can reach the system your records actually live in — that connection, not the model, is where these projects stall.
How people actually do it
No workflow names this activity yet, but these automate the same kind of work, with the prompts to paste and what to keep for yourself.
Who does this work
52 occupations in the O*NET database perform this activity. Each one has a full breakdown of its other tasks.
- Adult Basic Education, Adult Secondary Education, and English as a Second Language Instructors
- Agricultural Sciences Teachers, Postsecondary
- Anthropology and Archeology Teachers, Postsecondary
- Architecture Teachers, Postsecondary
- Area, Ethnic, and Cultural Studies Teachers, Postsecondary
- Art, Drama, and Music Teachers, Postsecondary
- Astronomers
- Atmospheric, Earth, Marine, and Space Sciences Teachers, Postsecondary
- Biological Science Teachers, Postsecondary
- Business Teachers, Postsecondary
- Career/Technical Education Teachers, Middle School
- Career/Technical Education Teachers, Postsecondary
- Career/Technical Education Teachers, Secondary School
- Chemistry Teachers, Postsecondary
- Communications Teachers, Postsecondary
- Computer Science Teachers, Postsecondary
- Criminal Justice and Law Enforcement Teachers, Postsecondary
- Economics Teachers, Postsecondary
- Education Administrators, Postsecondary
- Education Teachers, Postsecondary
- Elementary School Teachers, Except Special Education
- Engineering Teachers, Postsecondary
- English Language and Literature Teachers, Postsecondary
- Environmental Science Teachers, Postsecondary
- Family and Consumer Sciences Teachers, Postsecondary
- Foreign Language and Literature Teachers, Postsecondary
- Forestry and Conservation Science Teachers, Postsecondary
- Geography Teachers, Postsecondary
- Health Specialties Teachers, Postsecondary
- History Teachers, Postsecondary
- Instructional Coordinators
- Kindergarten Teachers, Except Special Education
- Law Teachers, Postsecondary
- Library Science Teachers, Postsecondary
- Mathematical Science Teachers, Postsecondary
- Middle School Teachers, Except Special and Career/Technical Education
- Nursing Instructors and Teachers, Postsecondary
- Philosophy and Religion Teachers, Postsecondary
- Physics Teachers, Postsecondary
- Political Science Teachers, Postsecondary
- Political Scientists
- Psychology Teachers, Postsecondary
- Recreation and Fitness Studies Teachers, Postsecondary
- Secondary School Teachers, Except Special and Career/Technical Education
- Social Work Teachers, Postsecondary
- Sociology Teachers, Postsecondary
- Special Education Teachers, Elementary School
- Special Education Teachers, Middle School
- Special Education Teachers, Secondary School
- Substitute Teachers, Short-Term
- Teaching Assistants, Postsecondary
- Tutors
Work that goes with it
O*NET groups these under “Advise others on educational or vocational matters”. In practice they tend to be done by the same person, in the same sitting.
Method. The activity, its taxonomy placement and the occupations that perform it come straight from the public-domain O*NET 30.3 database. The automatability band is ours: we map each of O*NET’s 41 generalized work activities to how much of its output current software can produce, assuming a person still reviews and owns the result. It is a coarse three-way judgment on purpose. A precise-looking percentage here would be invented.