Career Adaptability: Changing Self and Situation for Satisfaction and Success

Abstract

Human beings must adapt to survive and thrive across all domains of life. Doing so in the work domain requires career adaptability—the particular capacity to hone and use psychosocial resources necessary to make changes in self and situation for career satisfaction and success. Rooted in life-span, life-space theory, the career adaptability construct has evolved both conceptually and practically since it was first introduced nearly 40 years ago. Career adaptability now represents a principal construct for comprehending vocational behavior and a focus of interventions to foster life-career design. As a meta-competency for effective career construction and life design, career adaptability today offers a cross-nationally valid and vital conceptual and practical frame for assisting individuals to manage their careers within changing world and local economies and job markets. The present chapter traces the origins and evolution of career adaptability as a psychological construct and discusses its significance for career studies and intervention. Career adaptability fits the contemporary landscape of careers as a focus for theory and practice to assist individuals to build resilience; change self and circumstances in relation to fluctuating career contexts; and successfully navigate career development tasks, career transitions, and work-based traumas.