Career Theory Individual Perspectives

1
Career Theory Individual Perspectives

• Career Development

2
Overview

• Objective Subjective Faces of Career
• Objective careers career patterns
• Subjective careers
• Career Stress
• Adjustment
• Theories of Career Development and Career Choice
• Developmental perspective (Super, 1957,1980)
• Behaviourist perspective (Krumboltz et al, 1976)
• Differentialist perspective (Holland, 1959)
• Decision Making perspective (Tiedman OHara,
  1963)
• Structuralist perspective (Robert, 1977)

3
The Concept of Career

• Career the sequence of employment-related
  positions, roles, activities and experiences as
  encountered by a person (Arnold et al, 1998
  Greenhaus Callanan, 1994)
• Career is a metaphor for upward progression in
  a public, institutional sense.
• Vs
• Career represents the experiences of the
  individual - their personal development and
  progression.

4
The Context of Career

• Recent changes in organisations/work (Arnold et
  al, 1998)
• increasing workload for individuals
• organisational changes (delayering, downsizing)
• increasing global competition
• more team-based work (expert teams, limited time,
  clear goals)
• more short-term contracts
• frequent changes in skills required
• more part-time jobs
• changing workforces (less school leavers, older
  workers)
• increasing self-employment, small business
• flexible working (working at home, teleworking,
  flexi-time)
• Impacts lateral or downward moves more common,
  increased concern about quality of worklife gt
  org.less responsible
• Schein (1990) Internal vs External Career
• Internal subjective, individual-oriented view
• External objective realities and constraints in
  the world of work

5
Career Patterns

• Many models presuppose careers take place within
  an organisation/occupation - an ordered
  progression through series of related jobs (N.B.
  Locals vs Cosmopolitans)
• Driver (1982) Types of Career Pattern
• Transitory
• Steady-state
• Linear
• Spiral
• Watts (1981) types of job change - influenced
  by employment contract - core employee or
  temp./contract/consultant-style
• N.B. some people just hold a series of unrelated
  jobs. Is the concept of career still applicable?

6
Work-Role Transitions (subjective
careers)Nicholson (1990)

• Preparation what both the individual and the
  organisation do before the employee starts, to
  integrate them into the workplace (psychological
  contract, RJPs).
• Issue of realism and congruence
• Hughes (1958) reality shock
• Encounter newcomer tries to establish a mental
  map information seeking (task, role, group,
  organisation).
• Morrison (1993) active info seeking
  satisfaction, performance commitment.
  Successful strategy monitoring
• Louis (1981) newcomer socialisation - change,
  contrast surprise (Arnold, 1988 - UK graduates
  experiences)

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• Adjustment employee has an understanding of the
  workplace - now tries to understand how to go
  about doing the job in the long-term.
• Orientations (Schein, 1971) (a) custodianship,
  (b) content innovation (c) role innovation.
• People-processing (Van Maanen and Schein, 1979)
  individualised or institutionalised.
• Latack (1989) career stress - Transactional
  Process Theories
• Nicholson (1984) 4 modes of adjustment
  (replication, absorption, determination,
  exploration)

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Adjustment, continued...

• Schein (1978) Concept of Career Anchors
• Career Anchor an area of the self-concept that
  is so central to the individual that (s)he would
  not give it up, even if forced to make a
  difficult choice
• Peoples anchors develop and become clear during
  their early career, as a result of experience and
  learning from it.
• Being able to identify ones career anchor is an
  important step in successful career
  (self-)management
• It is important for an organisation to identify
  the career anchors it offers (for informing
  selection, transfer, promotion, etc.)

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Scheins Career Anchors (1993)

• Managerial Competence want/like to manage
  others. Generalists. Value advancement,
  leadership, responsibility, income.
• Technical/Functional Competence want/like to
  develop specialist skills/knowledge. Build their
  identity around the content of their work.
• Security want/like reliable, predictable work
  environment.
• Autonomy want to be free of all restrictions in
  their work activities (clothing, hours/times
  worked, etc)
• Entrepreneurial Creativity want/like to create
  their own products, services and/or
  organisations.
• Challenge want/like winning against strong
  competition
• Service/Dedication want/like work expressing
  social,political, religious or other personal
  values
• Lifestyle Integration want a work-life balance.

10
Stabilisation

• Being an old hand at the job.
• Maintaining aspects of a valued work role/career
  and personalising it to meet own needs.
• Hall (1976) increasing restriction in
  opportunities available
• Identity and stability issues become increasingly
  salient
• Career plateau (mentor, coach, etc.)

11
Relocation

• Brett et al (1992)
• Job Transfer different part of the country
• International Transfer different country
• Group Moves relocation of a large number of
  employees who normally work together.
• Issues surrounding relocation
• disruption to family (childrens education,
  friendships)
• spouses willingness to relocate other non-work
  factors best predictor of relocation success.
• age, education, number of children less
  significant
• cultural/language differences mean international
  transfers most likely to be least successful

12
Transitions in- and out of the job market

• Entry into work from school.
• Arnold (1990) relatively unstressful
• Retirement
• gradual winding-down/ disengagement
• subjective experience of retirement
• Bosse et al (1991) factors assisting adjustment
• health, income, voluntary retirement, personal
  preparation

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Developmental PerspectiveSuper (1957, 1980)

• Career Development a process of implementing a
  self-concept and testing this self-concept
  against reality
• 5 stages
• Growth 0-14yrs
• Exploration 15-24yrs
• Establishment 25-44yrs
• Maintenance 45-65yrs
• Decline/Disengagement 65yrs
• Career Rainbow and roles
• Evaluation
• considers career outside of the organisational
  context
• career self-concept black box theory?
• based on small, unrepresentative sample

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Behaviourist PerspectiveKrumboltz, Mitchell
Jones (1976)

• Social Learning Theory (Bandura) genetics,
  environmental factors, learning experiences,
  cognitive and emotional responses, performance
  skills determine career path.
• Decision points influenced by personal and
  situational variables
• Learning experiences (instrumental vs
  associative)
• Factors influencing a preference for a certain
  occupation
• being positively reinforced for participation in
  related activities
• observe a valued model being positively
  reinforced
• being positively reinforced by a valued model
• being exposed to positive words/images of that
  occupation
• Evaluation mechanistic but does recognise
  importance of modelling (vicarious learning)

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Differentialist Perspective Holland (1959)

• Hereditary factors cultural personal factors
  gt hierarchy of preferred methods for
  environmental tasks (habitual methods)
• Vocational choice - series of adjustive
  orientations in accordance with occupational
  environments available.
• Vocational Orientation lifestyle (values,
  interests, social interactions)
• Direct self toward major occupational class.
  Based on
• development
• self-evaluation of ability to perform
• mediating factors - personal (social pressure
  from family/peers) socio-economic.

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Holland (1973) Holland Gottfredson
(1976)Vocational Types Theory

• Realistic out-door type. Like activities
  requiring physical strength/co-ordination. Not
  keen on socialising
• Investigative likes concepts logic. Enjoys
  abstract thought. Often interested in physical
  sciences.
• Artistic uses imagination a lot. Likes to
  express ideas and feelings. Dislikes rules and
  regs. Enjoys music, art, drama.
• Social enjoys the company of others, esp. in
  affiliative relationships. Tend to be warm and
  caring
• Enterprising enjoy the company of others, but
  less affiliative (rather dominate or persuade).
  Enjoy action rather than thought.
• Conventional likes rules and regs. Often well
  organised, but not very imaginative.
• People seek congruence between vocational
  interests environments. Incongruence gt stress
  dissatisfaction
• Vocational Preference Inventory, Strong
  Vocational Interest Inventory, Self-Directed
  Search (Holland, 1985)

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Evaluation of Holland, 1959 (e.g. Spokane, 1985)

• Holland (1962) 2 x large n studies of US high
  school students
• Vocational Types good reflection of basic
  personality dimensions as described in general
  psychology. Hexagonal conceptualisation
  reasonable approximation of similarities/differenc
  es
• Evidence congruence is correlated to satisfaction
  and success cannot infer causality.
• Using 3 types to describe personality is
  unnecessary
• Vocational Type and Career ? Career chosen or
  ideal career
• Most construct validity research relied upon
  paper--pencil measures greater need for
  behavioural outcomes (e.g. absence rates, rate of
  promotion, etc).

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Decision-Making Perspective

• The Process of Career Decision
• Tiedman OHara (1963) Anticipation,
  Crystallization Stabilisation. Gelatt (1962)
  3 systems Prediction, Relative Preference
  Evaluation and Selection.
• Models Predicting Choice of Career
• Knefelkamp Slepitz (1976) stage theory.
  Piaget. Adult developmental concerns, 9 cognitive
  developmental tasks
• 1. Locus of Control 6. Openness to Alternatives
  
• 2. Analysis 7. Ability to resume
  responsibility
• 3. Synthesis 8. Ability to take on new roles
• 4. Semantic Structure 9. Ability to take risks
  with oneself
• 5. Self-Processing

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Knefelkamp Slepitz (1976)

• stages 1-2 Dualism stages 3-4 Multiplicity,
  stages 5-6 Relativism, stages 7-9 Commitment
  with Relativism.
• Evaluation
• Empirical basis of theory is weak (interview
  study - 35 students)
• Limits to theory
• how long will each stage last?
• Does not consider blocks or regression through
  stages

20
Structuralist Perspective Robert (1977)
Theory of Opportunity Structures

• Central tenet the transition to employment
  needs to be understood in terms of opportunity
  structures helping people to adjust to the
  opportunities available to them, not
  unrealistically raising their expectations
• Tenet comes from
• observations on extent to which job choice is
  meaningful
• growing evidence of the lack of congruence
  between peoples self-concepts and
  job/occupation.
• Emphasis on career guidance (career is an
  unfolding pattern dictated by opportunity
  structures)

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Conclusions

• Freewill vs Determinism
• Nature vs Nurture
• Do theories of 20th century theories of career
  choice and career development hold true in 21st
  century?