The Scholarly Commons Executive Career Management: Switching Organizations and the Boundaryless Career Part of the Human Resources Management Commons (original) (raw)

Gains and losses related to career transitions within organisations

Journal of Vocational Behavior, 2014

With this study we aim to look at potential gains and losses in terms of higher career satisfaction and increased strain levels as a consequence of intraorganisational upward career transitions. Following the idea of a matching principle, we further expected stressors to mediate the relationship between transitions and strain, and resources to mediate the relationship between transitions and career satisfaction. Altogether, N = 581 employees from 11 German organisations filled in an online questionnaire twice, with a time lag of one year. About 20% of the respondents stated having experienced upward transitions. SEM analyses using latent difference scores for the mediators and dependent variables revealed that career transitions are related to increased strain (irritation), but also to higher career satisfaction. Furthermore, specific indirect effects could be shown to link upward career transitions with irritation via elevated time pressure and increased work-home interference. The link between upward career transitions and career satisfaction could be shown to be mediated by increased person-job fit, but not by autonomy. Results are discussed in light of organisational and individual measures in order to increase gains and to reduce losses related to upward career transitions.

Career Success, Mobility and Extrinsic Career Satisfaction: Studying Corporate Managers

1987

Research into career success has usually dealt with objective aspects of career paths such as income and job title. Cognitive variables can also be used tc assess career success, career mobility, and career satisfaction. This study examined demographics, job properties, and personal attributes as well as the relationship between career strategies and career success. The sample was obtained from 14 major corporation located in metropolitan Los Angeles, California and employing more than 1,000 people locally. Personnel officers at the firms distributed questionnaires to managers who were supervising others and had both hiring and budget responsibility; had been identified by their organizations as talented; and were considered realistically likely to be promoted within the next 3 years. The final sample of 96 male and 98 female managers completeu a career development questionnaire on demographics, job properties and personal attributes, career strategies, and success. The data revealed that demographics were the best predictor set when trying to explain a person's career success and mobility. None of the predictor sets explained career satisfaction. The usefulness of career strategies when studying career is brought into question by the weak relationship between career strategies, career success, and career mobility. (Author/NB) 3000(30000000000(300000000000(300000000(*****30000000(***xxxxxxxxxxxxxx Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best that can be made from the original document. 30000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000090E

Organizational career development isnot dead: a case study on managing the new career during organizational change

Journal of Organizational Behavior, 2007

New forms of careers have received increased attention in contemporary organizational research. A prominent focus in this research has been whether and how, in an increasingly unpredictable career environment, individuals are taking responsibility for their own career development. The implication is that career is becoming less central to organizational management practices. At the same time there is evidence that organizational changes typically described in this literature (such as delayering the organization in a quest for flexibility) have had a negative impact on career progress, resulting in resistance to change. The implication here is that career concerns are more central to organizational management practices. This in-depth qualitative case study examines whether individuals do in fact take more responsibility for their career development during times of organizational change. We also examine whether this does indeed mean that the organization takes less responsibility for career management. Our data indicate that individuals are, in fact, taking more responsibility for their own careers. At the same time we found that the organization in our case study also became more actively involved in career development and management. However, this active approach did not resemble traditional top-down career management and development. To us, the pattern of organizational and individual career development actions appear to constitute a kind of 'organizational dance,' a highly interactive mutual influence process, in which both parties are at once the agent and the target of career influence. Strengths and limitations of the study are discussed, as are directions for future research. charge of her or his career and is taking increasing responsibility for it. As a result, it is suggested, careers are becoming less central to organizational management practices.

Reconciling Perceptions of Career Advancement with Organizational Change: A Case from General Motors

Human Organization, 1995

Little attention has been given in the literature to the effects of corporate restructuring on the career mobility and career perceptions of organizational "survivors." Employees remaining with the firm typically exhibit career mohility concerns since they anticipate that fewer job opportunities will exist, particularly within the managerial tier. Past research has neither compared actual career moves with employee perceptions of those moves, nor adequately emphasized perceptions of career mohility. This report examines the effects of a mid 1980s downsizing on sales and service employees in one General Motors division. Our results suggest that employee perceptions were rooted in past career path patterns. Because of this reliance on past behavior and the accuracy of their perceptions of past career movement, the majority continued to believe that they would advance in their careers. We discovered the longer an employee was associated with any given position, the less likely helshe was to anticipate future career movement (p< 0.01). Perceptions of career mobility change only when employees are personally affected by the restructuring; ideological change for the majority of organizational members not only follows change in organizational structure, but actually lags behind it.

Career pandemonium: Realigning organizations and individuals

Academy of Management Perspectives, 1996

Executive Overview Widespread internal changes in organizations are wreaking havoc on traditional careers. Many people are experiencing major difficulties in their attempts to adapt to the uncertainties of career life. Observing these difficulties, writers on careers have begun to advise individuals to take personal control over their careers by becoming more versatile in their skills, accepting of change, and active in shaping their life at work. Increasingly, organizations are seen as freed from the responsibility of managing careers in their efforts to remain flexible and ready to shift with environmental changes. However, both individuals and organizations have needs for stability and for change. Organizations are better advised to adopt a pluralistic approach to career management that embraces different definitions of career success. In so doing, they will be better able to support the diverse needs of their employees and, simultaneously, enable the organization to reward and maintain diverse competencies in their workforces. Change requires change. Organizations today are making abundant changes internally to cope with a highly turbulent external environment. With frequent reorganizing, downsizing, rightsizing, delayering, flattening the pyramid, teaming and outsourcing taking place, careers and career opportunities are in pandemonium resulting from the progressive destabilization of relationships between people and organizations.'

Career Transitions across and within Organizations: Implications for Human Resource Development

Online Submission, 2008

Career development has been explored extensively in the literature because of its benefits to individuals and the organizations. Career transitions across and within organizations is receiving attention in this knowledge era. Limited studies however, have been undertaken to determine how individuals and organizations are coping with career transitions within and across organizations. This paper reviews pertinent literature and shows that individuals mast be proactive and be prepared to manage their own careers.

Career development in organizations and beyond: Balancing traditional and contemporary viewpoints

Human Resource Management Review, 2006

The changing nature of work has resulted in major transition in the shape of careers and their management within and outside organizations. Scholars, though, tend to suggest that the changes are overwhelming and colossal, whereas in reality much has remained stable. In this paper, I bring a balanced view of the management of careers in organizations and beyond. This paper takes into account recent developments in the nature of the business environment, and at the same time acknowledges that much of the basics in career development theory and practice is still valid for Western societies.

Career and employer change in the age of the ‘boundaryless’ career

Journal of Vocational Behavior

This study examined the direct effect of individual career concerns on career and employer change intention, as well as the buffering influence of organisational commitment on this relationship, based on the AMO model of behavioural change intention. Survey data, collected from 341 employees across industry sectors in Australia, showed that 'exploration' concerns related positively to both employer and career change intentions; the impact of exploration concerns on career change intention was buffered by affective commitment, however, and reinforced by normative commitment. 'Establishment' concerns related negatively to career change intention, and this effect was also buffered by level of affective commitment. The results point towards the distinct nature of employer and career change, and prompt calls for further research on the interplay of the myriad of factors that influence boundary-crossing career behaviour.