Multiple identities and career development of GLB immigrants

There has been increasing interest in the study of career development and career counselling for the gay men, lesbian women and bisexual (GLB) people given the clear link between sexual orientation and career development in the past two decades. Yet, there is still a relatively dearth of literature in this area, especially, much is unknown about the career identity and other related identity development experiences of GLB immigrant adults whose acculturation process intersects with cultural identity, race and ethnicity and sexual identity as they rebuild their careers in the host country. This article aims to explore the connections between multiple cultural identities and their affect on career development. It builds upon the current literature, uses some career development theories, and proposes career development and career counselling interventions for the target group.     

The well-being outcomes of career guidance

ABSTRACT

The potential for career guidance to impact on well-being has received insufficient attention in the UK. There are both conceptual and empirical reasons to expect that the impacts may be positive, but a lack of evidence directly testing this proposition. Career guidance has commonalities with therapeutic counselling suggesting analogous effects, and it promotes positive engagement in work and learning, which may be associated with health benefits. There are implications for services in reconciling health and employment objectives. However, the promotion of well-being need not imply quasi-clinical ways of working. A call is made for more research and debate in the career guidance community as to the extent and implications of the potentially important relationship between career guidance and well-being.     

Story telling: crafting identities

ABSTRACT

Career guidance clients are seeking to craft new identities that better position them in their careers. The focus of the present article is on narrative career counselling's potential contribution in providing a meaningful and useful experience for career guidance clients. To illustrate the potential of narrative career counselling, the story telling approach is offered as an example to illustrate how identity can be crafted in contextually and culturally sensitive ways.     

Life Design Career Counselling with an Abandoned Adolescent: A Case Study

This article describes the value of life design counselling with an abandoned adolescent female. The participant was selected purposively from among a group of abandoned adolescent females who had expressed a need for career counselling. The life intervention comprised two 90-minute sessions per week over a period of a month. Life design data included collage, family constellation, life line, career style interview, asset map and life chapters. Following the intervention, the participant demonstrated career adaptability and an eagerness to take an active part in her evolving life story. Life design counselling has potential to meet the career counselling needs of children with neglect and abandonment experience.     

Results of a Citation Analysis of the Career Counselling Field from an African Perspective

The study examined research and trends in career counselling published in selected professional sources during the period 1980–2010. Citation analysis was used in this study to investigate documents which were indexed in the Web of Science related to career counselling. Career counselling and related keywords were used jointly in the search for documents. There were a total of 730 documents judged to be relevant to the field of career counselling and were citation analysed. The number of citations related to the career counselling field has been increasing continuously since 2000. Research publications on career counselling are projected to increase for both South African authors and the authors of other African countries.     

Examining process constructs of narrative career counselling: an exploratory case study

The present article examines how the five process constructs of reflection, connectedness, meaning making, learning and agency are operationalised in a constructivist approach to career counselling, specifically a storytelling approach. This article reports on an exploratory case study of a Black South African female university student. The case study provides examples of how a career counsellor enacts these constructs and facilitates their development in a client, as well as examples of how they are evident in client dialogue and action. Insight into the process of a storytelling approach to narrative career counselling is demonstrated, from which tentative suggestions are made about how to facilitate the process constructs of reflection, connectedness, meaning making, learning and agency.     

Career Counselling in the 21st Century: A Reaction Article

This article reviews the articles on career counselling in the special edition of the Journal of Psychology in Africa. A thematic analysis to the content of the articles was conducted and common themes extrapolated. The main themes were (a) the shift toward postmodern career counselling, (b) the importance of cultural sensitivity in career counselling practice and (c) adolescents career development. This is followed by a reaction comment.     

The Power of Feelings

Abstract

The relationship between myth, the dream, narrative and career are explored in order to understand better the underlying factors that influence career development and will thus inform the work of career counsellors. A case study is used to illustrate how these insights can be used in practice.     

Applying the Chaos Theory of Careers as a Framework for College Career Centers

The chaos theory of careers (CTC; Pryor & Bright, 2011 ) has emerged as a career development theory to describe the reality of career development and account for the changing nature of work in the 21st century. Integrating CTC into a coherent framework accessible to practitioners is an ongoing process. In recent years, CTC has gained traction within some college career centers. Although techniques and interventions have been discussed to address some of the primary issues, no overarching framework has been conceptualized. This article proposes a model to conceptualize CTC in an accessible framework for college career centers, students, and beyond.     

Career guidance and therapeutic counselling: sharing ‘what works’ in practice with young people

Many young people in the UK and across the world, where austerity measures are biting deep, find themselves at a time of crisis and uncertainty in their lives. The assumptions previously held of clear and straightforward career paths are being challenged and ‘career’ has come to mean more than simply ‘work’ or ‘employment’. This has implications for career practice, where career advisers are engaging with a range of complex issues in their guidance interactions with clients. This article draws on research undertaken with therapeutic counsellors into ‘what works’ when counselling young people. It offers career practitioners the opportunity to reflect on four key emerging themes and to consider how the discipline of therapeutic counselling might inform guidance practice.     

Counselor Trainees' Interprofessional Self-Efficacy After a Career Development Intervention

Career development is a lifelong process of learning, working, and transitions that move a person closer to their preferred future. This study investigated the use of a career development intervention to help counselor trainees in a master's program and allied health students with integrating new perspectives in their future careers. This qualitative study with a diverse group of 12 participants provides important insight into career thoughts, career self-efficacy, and potential career development opportunities through interprofessional engagement career interventions. The findings are novel and have never been addressed in an empirical study for counselor trainees.     

Career development and counselling needs of LGBTQ high school students

There is a dearth of research concerning the career development and counselling issues that are relevant for high school students who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer (LGBTQ). As such, little is known to understand LGBTQ students when it comes to their career-related struggles and needs. This article attempts to examine the career development needs of LGBTQ high school students, addressing and analysing career problems from the unique circumstances of this student population. To do so, it provides an overview of the various career-related issues afflicting LGBTQ high school students. It then proposes a series of career guidance and counselling intervention considerations that are tailored to address the specific career needs and challenges of the LGBTQ high school students.     

Applying the principles and techniques of solution-focused therapy to career counselling

Career counselling aims to help clients become more effective agents in solving problems in their vocational aspects of life. To achieve this goal, theorists and practitioners are called upon to form useful helping approaches that can help clients in a more efficient and effective manner. This article proposes an alternative model toward this end by considering and adopting principles and techniques from the solution-focused therapy in career counselling practice. After a very brief introduction of the basic features of the solution-focused counselling, the paper reviews some key theoretical principles of the solution-focused therapy, and connects these principles to career counselling context. It then illustrates several solution-focused counselling techniques that are particularly applicable to career counselling intervention.     

Functions of Career Resilience Against Reality Shock,Focusing on Full‐time Employees During Their First Year of Work

The purpose of this study was to examine the role of career resilience in coping with reality shock. Career resilience was defined as psychological traits that help individuals to cope with career risks and promote their own career development. It consisted of five factors: (a) ability to cope with problems and changes; (b) social skills; (c) interest in novelty; (d) optimism about the future; and (e) willingness to help others. Full‐time employees in their first year of employment (N = 233) participated in an online survey to measure career resilience, reality shock, and the degree of career development. The study found that coping with changes and being optimistic about the future could prevent the experience of reality shock. The result also suggested that good social skills prevented experience of reality shock from inhibiting career development.     

Transforming career stories through poetry: a group-based career counselling intervention

ABSTRACT

Contemplating the school to work transition in the insecure and unpredictable twenty-first century world of work can be anxiety inducing for college students. Consequently, college students may develop disempowered career stories in which they feel ill prepared to explore career prospects or engage with the world of work. This paper describes a career counselling intervention aimed at transforming the disempowered career stories of college students into more empowered versions. Grounded in career construction theory and designed as a group modality, the intervention employs poetry therapy to enhance the development of internally defined and motivated career stories among the group participants. Although this paper highlights the Kenyan context, the intervention itself can easily be adapted to other contexts.     

Examining Career Readiness in a Liberal Arts Undergraduate Career Planning Course

This study explored a career planning course at the University of Minnesota–Twin Cities’ College of Liberal Arts. The course aimed to improve students’ career readiness through reflections about their liberal arts education. Individual interviews explored how the course affected students’ ability to articulate the value of their education to potential employers. The authors found that students learned how to articulate career competencies and developed an understanding of what a liberal arts education entails and how it aligns with career readiness. Implications for career development practice are highlighted.     

The career resources model: an integrative framework for career counsellors

Changes in the nature of work and organisations have led to an increased need for self-directed career management (SDCM). However, there is no consensus in the literature of what constitutes SDCM and many related concepts have been proposed. Integrating previous research across different conceptualisations of SDCM, the article proposes four critical career resources which are essential for career development in the modern context: human capital resources, social resources, psychological resources and identity resources. Implications of this framework for counselling practice are presented.     

Good looks and good practice: the attitudes of career practitioners to attractiveness and appearance

Empirical evidence attests the impact that career image has on objective career success, yet little is known of how career practitioners conceptualise and operationalise this information. This article presents the quantitative findings of an online survey of career practitioners (n?=?399, 74% female, 89% white and 75% from the U.K.) exploring their attitudes and practices towards issues of appearance and attractiveness. Career practitioners who participated in this survey acknowledged that beauty, self-presentation and interpersonal skills influence career success, and 96% of them considered conversations about career image as part of their professional remit. The career practitioners felt relatively comfortable and well informed in their discussions in this arena, but would welcome further guidance and training to inform their practice. Ethical and practical implications for the profession are considered.