Graduates' Construction Systems and Career Development

Abstract

The paper draws on the Chicago School's conceptualization of career and on Personal Construct Psychology to examine the relationships between graduates' construction systems and patterns of career development during the first 4 years of employment. It seeks to identify differences in trends of constructive revision between "successful" and "less successful" graduates. The study is based on 33 graduates who completed repertory grids on entering employment (T1), 6 months later (72), and 4 years later (T3), re-eliciting constructs each time. The results show some significant change in the nature of the constructs elicited by graduates over the 4 years; in particular, graduates made greater use of constructs related to achievement, cynicism, and organizational politics. Graduates whose career was more "successful" (i.e., who experienced one or two promotions during the 4 years of the study and felt generally satisfied with their careers) were more likely to use constructs related to social behavior and flexibility at T1, while graduates whose career was "less sucessful" (i.e., no promotion and felt dissatisfied with their careers) were more likely to construe themselves in terms of achievement and work competence at T1. Four years on, "successful" graduates tended to rely more on constructs related to achievement and flexibility, while "less successful" graduates were more likely to use constructs related to social behavior. The significance and implications of these results for organizational recruitment and development practices are discussed.