[2][3] From 1938 to the 1990s, vocational lists and employment matching offered by the U.S. government were available through the book, The Dictionary of Occupational Titles or the DOT.
"[2] With the shift in the economy, plans developed to replace the book format of the DOT with an online database.
Many applied psychologists have praised O*NET (e.g., Peterson, Mumford, Borman, Jeanneret, Fleishman, Levin, Campion, Mayfield, Morgeson, Pearlman, Gowing, Lancaster, Silver, & Dye, 2001).
It is a digital database which offers a "flexible system, allowing users to reconfigure data to meet their needs" as opposed to the "fixed format" of the DOT; it reflects the employment needs of an Information society rather than an Industrial society; costs the government and users much less than a printed book would, and is easier to update as new data is collected.
It can be used by businesses, educators, job seekers, human resources professionals, and the publicly funded Workforce Investment System to help meet the talent needs of our competitive global economy.