Nonwork orientations relative to career: A multidimensional measure

Although scholars typically assess an individual's nonwork role orientation relative to career as a unitary construct, we argue that a person's orientation toward nonwork roles is multi-dimensional. Drawing on a literature review demonstrating the need for improved constructs capturing changing relationships between career and multi-faceted nonwork orientations, and empirical data from three studies with samples at different career stages (early and mid-career), we use factor analysis and data from qualitative and longitudinal studies to develop three unique scales to assess a person's nonwork priorities relative to career orientations: family, personal life, and community service. There were generally positive relationships between the protean career scales and the new nonwork role orientation measures. Future research should move beyond a binary work–life or work–family models and include multi-dimensional measures of nonwork orientations relative to career.     

Felt and behavioral engagement in workgroups of professionals

This research proposes a two-dimensional measure of engagement for professionals in technically-oriented workgroups. It examines the relationship of their engagement to five workgroup outcomes: innovation, performance, satisfaction with the organization, career success, and intentions to stay. Three studies are reported involving: (1) a random sample of 123 workgroups and 1351 self and reports by others of professionals employed by a Fortune 100 company, (2) a panel study of 1024 of the study one professionals four months later, and (3) the replication of results with 827 professionals across three cultures. The results support felt engagement and behavioral engagement as distinct constructs that can be measured by both a self-report and assessments by others of workgroup engagement. The relationship of engagement to workgroup innovation, performance, satisfaction with the organization, career success, and intentions to stay generalized across four countries and cultures: U.S./North America, The Netherlands/Europe, Argentina, and India. Felt engagement was the best predictor of affective outcomes and intentions to stay when all variables were measured concurrently. Behavioral engagement was the best predictor of workgroup performance concurrently and over time. This research indicates that the two dimensions of engagement are important aspects of vocational adjustment for the success of professionals in technically-oriented workgroups. Implications for future research are to consider multiple dimensions of engagement, clearly define the population and setting for engagement, and to study engagement as a dynamic experience that warrants ongoing management and workgroup attention.     

Career development and personal functioning differences between work-bound and non-work bound students

We surveyed 506 Australian high school students on career development (exploration, planning, job-knowledge, decision-making, indecision), personal functioning (well-being, self-esteem, life satisfaction, school satisfaction) and control variables (parent education, school achievement), and tested differences among work-bound, college-bound and university-bound students. The work-bound students had the poorest career development and personal functioning, the university-bound students the highest, with the college-bound students falling in-between the other two groups. Work-bound students did poorest, even after controlling for parent education and school achievement. The results suggest a relationship between career development and personal functioning in high school students.     

Vocational self-concept crystallization as a mediator of the relationship between career self-management and job decision effectiveness

This article examines the influence of career self-management and vocational self-concept crystallization on job decision effectiveness and how vocational self-concept crystallization mediates the relationship between career self-management and job decision effectiveness. Six hundred and eleven Chinese employees participated in the research. Using hierarchical regression and structural equation modeling, the results showed that: (1) career self-management has a positive direct effect on vocational self-concept crystallization; (2) career self-management has a positive direct effect on job decision effectiveness; (3) vocational self-concept crystallization has a positive direct effect on job decision effectiveness; and (4) vocational self-concept crystallization partly mediates the relationship between career self-management and job decision effectiveness.     

Image theory and career aspirations: Indirect and interactive effects of status-related variables

The present study applied Image Theory (Beach, 1990) to test how different components of a person's value image (i.e., perceived social status identity and conformity to masculine and feminine gender role norms) interact to influence trajectories toward high career aspirations (i.e., high value for status in one's work and aspirations for advancement and achievement in one's career). Results from 224 undergraduate students demonstrated that value for status in work mediated the relationship between perceived social status and career aspirations. Conformity to feminine, but not masculine, gender role norms moderated the relationship between perceived status and value for status in work. Conformity to feminine norms also moderated the indirect relationship between perceived status and aspirations via value for status in work, yielding a pattern of moderated mediation.     

Career counsellors' perceptions of the severity of career decision-making difficulties

Individuals differ in the type and severity of the difficulties they face when making a career decision. Relying on the Gati, Krausz, and Osipow (1996) taxonomy of career decision-making difficulties, we elicited the judgements of 28 career counselling experts about factors that contribute to the perceived severity of the difficulties. Difficulties attributed to an internal or emotional cause were judged as more severe than difficulties attributed to an external or cognitive cause. With respect to the consequences, difficulties that prevent making a decision, or those that require long-term treatment, were judged as more severe than difficulties that may lead to a non-optimal decision, and those that require a short-term treatment. The analysis revealed that the factor that most affected the experts' severity judgements was the expected length of treatment. Treatment priority was affected only partially by severity, reflecting the role of other considerations.     

Exploring the path through which career adaptability increases job satisfaction and lowers job stress: The role of affect

The construct of career adaptability, or the ability to successfully manage one's career development and challenges, predicts several important outcomes; however, little is known about the mechanisms contributing to its positive effects. The present study investigated the impact of career adaptability on job satisfaction and work stress, as mediated by individuals' affective states. Using a representative sample of 1671 individuals employed in Switzerland we hypothesized that, over time, career adaptability amplifies job satisfaction and attenuates work stress, through higher positive affect and lower negative affect, respectively. The data resulted from the first three waves of a longitudinal project on professional paths conducted in Switzerland. For each wave, participants completed a survey. Results of the 3-wave cross-lagged longitudinal model show that employees with higher career adaptability at Time 1 indeed experienced at Time 3 higher job satisfaction and lower work stress than those with lower career adaptability. The effect of career adaptability on job satisfaction and work stress was accounted for by negative affect: Individuals higher on career adaptability experienced less negative affect, which led to lower levels of stress and higher levels of job satisfaction, beyond previous levels of job satisfaction and work stress. Overall results support the conception of career adaptability as a self-regulatory resource that may promote a virtuous cycle in which individuals' evaluations of their resources to cope with the environment (i.e., career adaptability) shape their affective states, which in turn influence the evaluations of their job.     

When career paths cease to exist: A qualitative study of career behavior in a crisis economy

Using grounded theory methodology, this study examines the ways young professionals describe their career paths in the aftermath of the 2008 Financial Crisis. We interviewed a sample of 29 Greek women professionals (24 to 32 years old) to examine their career behavior during this recession. Findings reveal prevailing effects of professional identity and profession-consistent learning goals on participants' career behavior. Specifically, those individuals without a strong professional identity or profession-consistent learning goals are more likely to anticipate and engage in career activities unrelated to their professions, a group whom we refer to as Shifters. In contrast,     

Relation of career adaptability to meaning in life and connectedness among adolescents in Hong Kong

This study examined relationships among career adaptability, meaning in life, and connectedness in Hong Kong with Chinese male and female Grade 9 students (n = 543). The results indicated that presence of meaning in life positively predicted connectedness; and in the males career concern was predicted by presence of meaning in life. Also in males, career control was predicted both by presence and search for meaning in life, while career curiosity was predicted by connectedness to school, and by presence and search for meaning in life. Career confidence was predicted by connectedness to school, and presence and search of meaning in life. In the females, career concern was predicted by presence of meaning in life and connectedness to school, but negatively by connectedness to peers. Career control and career curiosity were predicted by presence and search for meaning in life. Career confidence was predicted by presence of meaning in life. Limitations of the study are identified; and implications for future research and guidance with Chinese adolescents in schools are discussed.     

Narrating career,positioning identity and constructing gender in an Italian adolescent's personal narratives

This article explores identity career narratives as a gendered and gendering discourse. The ‘gender differences’ approach to career development conceives of gender as a dichotomous and fixed variable influencing various aspects of career. In contrast to this mainstream approach, the paper adopts a post-structural view and reads identity and gender in terms of performativity, that is to say, constituted through the productive power of discourses. Through a detailed analysis of a text written by Giada, an adolescent involved in a career counseling project in Italy, we analyze how her career narratives implicate and constitute gender in their telling. In particular, we present the discourses that frame Giada's career narrative and we highlight how these discourses position Giada as a woman and as female. These discourses can be read as regulatory discourses: shaping and reflecting particular understandings of gender. However, we also highlight Giada's agency in questioning the regulatory practice of such discourses through linguistic acts. In the conclusions, we further explore the potential implications of these research findings for a rethinking of career counseling research and practice.