Sustainable Career Research Articles

The Experiences of Clinical Academic Nurses: A Meta-Aggregation

ObjectiveHistorically, clinical academic careers were only available for dental and medical professions. The title of a clinical academic nurse is recognized as a role that concurrently engages in both clinical practice and research. This systematic review aimed to synthesis qualitative evidence to understand the experiences of clinical academic nurses. Data SourcesA meta-aggregation systematic review was conducted. Key search terms were used in CINAHL and MEDLINE. The review has been reported according to ENTREQ checklist. This meta-aggregation review followed the principles from Joanna Briggs Institute (JBI) and the reviewers conducted a methodological quality assessment on all included studies. Qualitative studies which explored experiences of clinical academic nurses were included. ConclusionA total of 2,202 articles identified five studies met the inclusion criteria. Five synthesized findings from the included qualitative studies, related to (i) clinical academic preparation, (ii) challenges, (iii) enablers, (iv) clinical practice, and (v) role expectation of clinical academic nursing roles. The meta-aggregation has identified that although there are numerous clinical academic nursing discussion articles, commentaries, and editorials on the topic area, few empirical studies have explored the perceptions and experiences of clinical academic roles in nursing. Implications for Nursing PracticeThis systematic review has highlighted the variety of reported experiences of clinical academic nursing in relation to implications for practice, research, and leadership. Clinical academic roles are being developed across the nursing professions outside of medicine, and effective leadership it is important to support sustainable career pathways and curricula and to enable the evaluation of these roles. This review has made an important contribution to the literature by highlighting several issues to consider in developing and safeguarding the progress already made in clinical academic nursing career pathways.

In the Eye of the Hurricane: Careers under Lockdown

The COVID-19 pandemic has created career disruptions and shocks for many individuals, due to layoffs, reduced work hours and increased work–life conflict. Our study aimed to explore individual-level perceptions of people regarding their careers during the first lockdown in the UK, and to test potential implications of the situation for individuals’ career sustainability. For a deeper understanding of these perceptions, we used a sequential mixed-methods research design. First, we conducted a qualitative study, using semi-structured interviews to explore how people perceive their careers during early stages of the pandemic. We identified two themes that characterize the common experiences during this time period, namely employer support and careful optimism, that play an important role in the way careers unfold. Then, in the quantitative study, we conducted an online survey to empirically test a research model that links the concept of employer support with employability, career satisfaction and mental well-being. We also investigate the mediating role of career empowerment, which is a motivational cognitive construct that captures individual cognitions of agentic control over one’s career. Our research provides a rich snapshot that depicts people’s perceptions of careers during a shock event, which has both theoretical and practical implications.

It’s all about identity: The identity constructions of LGBT entrepreneurs from an intersectionality perspective

This article illustrates how lesbian, gay, bisexual and trans (LGBT) entrepreneurs engage in identity construction from an intersectionality perspective. Our empirical findings suggest that the sexual identities of our interviewees are essential aspects of their daily business lives in terms of their entrepreneurial identities and their motivations, key success factors and the barriers they face. By analysing their experiences from an intersectionality perspective, we illustrate how the sexual minority entrepreneurs in our study internalise and respond to dominant societal ideas characterising ‘the entrepreneur’ as masculine, heterosexual and male, vis-à-vis ‘the homosexual’, constructed as feminine, weak and different. We discuss two predominant manifestations of their responses to these contextual forces, portrayed in their identities as entrepreneurs and sexual minorities simultaneously and the ways these identities are experienced. Our study contributes to the literature on minority entrepreneurship, specifically the LGBT entrepreneurship literature, and on intersectionality and career sustainability, focusing on how LGBT entrepreneurs conduct entrepreneurship at the intersection of their sexuality and gender.

P130 The lived experience of shift work, sleep loss and fatigue in Australian paramedics

Abstract Introduction Paramedics are essential health workers, and are regularly exposed to shift work, which negatively impacts sleep and fatigue. Paramedics also experience adverse mental health outcomes and sleep disorders at higher rates than the general population. Consequently, retention and occupational burnout issues are common. However, the relationship between shift work, sleep disorders, fatigue, and mental wellbeing in paramedics is poorly understood, limiting our ability to design and implement effective interventions. Method This study uses a qualitative action research design involving one-to-one interviews, with an intended sample of 30 paramedics (completion Aug 2022). The Scenario Invention Task Technique is used, requiring workers to explore how they engage and interact with their work. Participants generate challenging scenarios specific to their work when feeling rested, and then consider the same scenario when feeling extremely fatigued. Data are analysed using an inductive thematic structure. Results Analysis of preliminary data (n=10) indicates sleep loss and fatigue negatively impact workers’ ability to manage challenging scenarios and the self-regulation of emotions. While participants know sleep problems impact their wellbeing, limited knowledge on identification and management of sleep disorders is apparent. Early findings suggest an optimal window for better sleep education would be during internship, and paramedics suggest the information needs to be provided by an expert, and trusted, voice. Discussion Study findings will help inform sleep education, screening and support toolkits about sleep, fatigue and shift work tailored to paramedics in order to support wellbeing and sustainable careers.

Sustainable career and employability of student leaders in China.

Research has shown that most employers prefer employing graduates with student leadership experience in colleges and most of the student leaders have sustainable development in their careers in China. Compared with students without leadership experience, student leaders are easier to get promotion and development opportunities in the workplace. To discuss this question, researchers chose employers, student leaders, and teachers as research participants in an effort to answer the question of why employers prefer graduates with experience being student leaders. This study focuses on what key competencies student leaders possess and how their competencies can match the capability requirement of employers. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 9 outstanding student leaders, 4 class teachers, 2 student affairs administrators, and 8 human resource managers from two vocational colleges in Beijing. We find that student leaders have strong social competence, emotional competence, action competence, responsibility, and resilience which employers value and these competencies are essential to career development in the workplace. These competencies are considered to be helpful to support student leaders to adapt to the real work environment quickly and achieve career success.

Creating sustainable businesses and careers: analysis of entrepreneurs’ life stories through the lens of career sustainability

Purpose: This study aimed to analyze how the career-building process of sustainable entrepreneurs occurs from the perspective of sustainable careers and how the influential factors in their career decisions are related to the dimensions and characteristics of sustainable careers. Design/methodology/approach: This is a qualitative study carried out by analyzing three Brazilian entrepreneurs’ life stories. Subsequently, the data were submitted to narrative analysis using the Atlas.ti software and then interpreted using sustainable career’s dimensions and characteristics. Findings: The study corroborates the literature on entrepreneurship, sustainability, and careers, shedding new light on the career decision process of sustainable entrepreneurs from the assumptions of the sustainable career perspective. We identified the emergence of influential categories as a disorienting dilemma, the importance of agency and meaning dimensions and the career coherence with values, quality of life, and self-fulfillment. In addition, sustainable entrepreneurship appears to be in line with the ideals of decent work, allowing for individual well-being, matching life and career values, and long-term employability. Originality: The sustainable career perspective offers an innovative, dynamic, and systemic perspective to understanding the professional trajectories of sustainable entrepreneurs, considering their learning along their trajectory, crossing different social spaces, experiences, and creations, which allow them to improve the adaptability necessary for the sustainability of their careers.

Trajectories of part-time work and sickness absence among shift working healthcare employees

Abstract Background Healthcare systems are facing major challenges due to population ageing, increased need for care, and economic challenges combined with staff shortage. The existing need for longer work careers combined with increasing turnover rates in healthcare highlights the need to understand working hours in association with work capacity and sustainable work careers. We aimed to investigate the concurrent changes in part-time work and sickness absence (SA) among healthcare employees without any SA spell >14 days at baseline. Methods Annual working hour and SA data from 23 hospital districts and cities in Finland for 2008-2019 (172 922 employees with at least one work shift in any year). The sample was restricted to 20274 employees with ≤31 work shifts/year in 3 consequent years during the follow-up and without any SA spell >14 days at baseline in 2008. Part-time work/year (yes/no), SA months/year, and nightwork/year (% of nightwork of all shifts) as time varying covariate were used in the group-based trajectory models examining the concurrent changes. Models for age groups (in 2008 and categorized into < 25 years of age, ≥25 and <40 years, ≥40 and <55 years, and >55 years) will be considered later. Results A five-trajectory solution identified groups for “stable full-time work without SA” (56.8%), “increasing part-time work and stable very low SA” (13.5%), “slight increase both in part-time work and SA” (16.5%), “steep increase in part-time work and reversed low U-shape in SA months” (5.0%), and “stable part-time work and low SA” (8.2%) across 2009-2019. Conclusions These initial findings indicate that while most employees work full-time without SA, those who transfer from working full-time to part-time during follow-up from 2009 to 2019 seem to have low SA. Thus, part-time work may promote work capacity, and accompanied by part-time work disability benefits, offer a tool for employers to support sustainable working life and to keep older employees at work. Key messages

The Portuguese observatory on occupational psychosocial factors: contribution for public health

Abstract To achieve the goal of sustainable employment, considering the profile of the Portuguese working population (PWP), is needed a range of strategies to ensure long, productive, and sustainable careers allied with a better quality of working life, health, and wellbeing, but also with public health policies grounded on scientifically validated and reliable data. This is possible through a comprehensive working system approach that ensures workers will be mentally and physically able to remain at work by the balance between work demands and individual resources allied with public health policies transfer into the workplaces by organizations’ leadership and policy makers. The Portuguese Observatory on Occupational Factors (Popsy@Work) aims at addressing this global challenge by: i) digitally collecting psychosocial data on the PWP; ii) implementing and strengthening of a psychosocial occupational health surveillance digital system; iii) providing reference values for the PWP concerning Psychosocial Health; iv) Transferring to society knowledge and best practices; v) Raising awareness on the importance of psychosocial management in occupational settings based on science. Popsy@work is a digital platform that collects and aggregates psychosocial data analytically and creates a visualization hub adding value to data on the PWP and giving science back to society in a usable way, empowering workers, strengthening organizations and grounding public policies. Pospy@Work considers the development of strategic intelligence on levels and inequalities of psychosocial health and well-being in occupational settings by robust metrics and reference data. Creating opportunities for national policy dialogue on inequalities, including the psychosocial health of the PWP through collaboration with diverse sectors identifying and mapping subgroups of populations whose unmet needs require specific outreach measures. Key messages

Preparing for a Sustainable Career

Preparing for a Sustainable Career

How do individual factors affect career sustainability? An investigation of cascading effects through the career construction model of adaptation

PurposeThough the recent conceptualization of career sustainability, defining its indicators and dimensions prompted an important field of careers research, empirical research is still in its infancy. The current study empirically investigates how proactive personality, career adaptability and proactive career behaviors promote career sustainability based on the career construction model of adaptation.Design/methodology/approachThe authors used a two-wave survey design to collect data from 414 full-time working professionals representing different organizations located in India. The authors tested the proposed hypotheses using structural equation modeling in IBM SPSS AMOS.FindingsResults supported a serial indirect effect model with career adaptability and proactive career behaviors carrying the effect of proactive personality on career sustainability.Originality/valueThe study contributes to the emerging sustainable careers literature by unveiling the role of individual factors in career sustainability. Furthermore, the authors investigated these relationships through the complete career construction model of adaptation. By doing so, the current study contributes to careers literature by revealing the linkage between the career construction model of adaptation and career sustainability.

Exploring Predictors of Development and Career Planning Among TVET Educators

Career planning and development a key factor that provides added value to career sustainability. Career development approaches have recently changed due to the fast-paced global change, competitive industry needs, demands, and global education trends. Traditionally, it was the responsibility of an institution to guarantee that its educators possessed the skills necessary to achieve its long-term objectives. Currently, however, educators should be accountable for their career growth. Therefore, a survey was conducted to discover predictors of development and career paling for TVET educators (n = 141). A multiple regression analysis was conducted for all sets of career planning variables such as career aspirations (88.48%), personal aspirations and drive (85.93%), current competency (86.00%), current learning and development opportunities (82.05%), and company support 87.45%) is measured. This study found changes in the predictor, personal aspirations and drive, current competency, current learning and development opportunities, and organization support are significantly associated with changes in career aspiration. This majority of TVET educators are aware and willing to improve their knowledge and skills to meet the standard of current changes in TVET education needs and demands. The finding indicated that a proven technique for meeting organizational and personnel demands includes creating career routes that allow TVET educators to comprehend their options for advancement within the institution and collecting information to assess their abilities for career relevancy and sustainability.

Family-supportive supervisor behaviors and career sustainability of e-commerce female workers: A mixed-method approach.

Women play an essential role in promoting societal and economic harmony development. However, compared with their male counterparts, female employees usually have to take on more family responsibilities while they endeavor to perform well at work. It is inevitable for them to face work–family conflicts; therefore, how to make female employees' careers more sustainable is a critical concern. Even though female career sustainability is well-explored in the literature, the combined effect of worker self-efficacy and family-supportive supervisor behaviors (FSSBs) on female career sustainability remains unexplored. To fill this gap, this study examines the influence of FSSB on female employee career sustainability, as well as the mediating role of self-efficacy. Moreover, a mixed-method approach was used to test the proposed relationships. The results indicate that FSSB has a positive impact on female career sustainability. Furthermore, the findings revealed that FSSB promotes female career sustainability through self-efficacy. This study establishes a theoretical framework for further research on the relationships between leader behavior and employee career sustainability. At the same time, it offers practical implications for supervisors in the management of subordinate career sustainability.

Sustainable Careers and Flourishing Organizations

The idea of this Special Issue emerged within the last two years that (exclusively focusing on the impact of the pandemic on working life) will pass to history as one of the most complex times for individuals and organizations [...]

Impact of the Global Megatrends, COVID-19, and Digital Economy on Professional Career Management Transformation in Asian Countries

This research systematically analyzes the effects that global megatrends, digitalizing economy, and the continuing COVID-19 pandemic are having on the transformation of professional career management and changing professional skills for achieving career purposes and tasks, providing a competent approach to the labor market. It also suggests a sustainable career management process for people to prepare career goals, objectives, and ambitions in the rapidly evolving digital landscape. Following this aim, the secondary analysis of the literature reviewed aided in offering important information to satisfy the original research targets and aims. Thus, the study maintained an exploratory and deductive research design to analyze the qualitative data gathered on the phenomenon of professional career management under the digital transformation in Asian countries. The analysis reveals that some megatrends have transformed how professional career development occurs. This paper is novel because it provides a critical assessment of the global megatrends and the impact of the digital economy related to professional career management transformation, with specific emphasis on Asian countries during the COVID-19 pandemic. Thus, the paper redounds the extant literature, making a significant contribution to the current debate in the literature. Additionally, it is expected to contribute to the sustainable development of the labor market in Asian countries based on system research and converging the concepts of transformation processes in professional career management affected by megatrends with theoretical and methodological support.

Career Path Decisions and Sustainable Options

Career planning has become more important than standalone job decisions in the current environment, where individuals have a wider range of choices of occupations and jobs than ever before. This paper reviews the theoretical developments in career guidance theory and recommends a holistic approach towards ‘Career Path Guidance’, incorporating psychological, sociological and developmental perspectives. An approach that considers several future steps in a career cannot be without challenges. The contextual and environmental situations along with individual characteristics are subject to change along a career path. Additionally, different stages in a career path are another variable that needs consideration to achieve a sustainable future. It has, therefore, been proposed that the career course be mapped by considering external factors, internal improvements and path-related dynamism. A multidimensional understanding of career guidance and the amount, complexity and sensitivity of the data involved mean that this approach may be better executed using computer-assisted systems that can source and logically analyze a large amount of information from several sources to produce coherent, sustainable and practical career path decisions.

대학생 진로 자기주도성 척도 개발 및 타당화

Objectives This study aims to develop and validate a university students career self-directedness scale to find out the factors. Methods To achieve this purpose, this study was developed components and sub-questions through literature review and seven factors and 51 items through 2 rounds of expert consultation. and then, conducted a survey of 382 college students nationwide, and also, conducted item analysis, exploratory factor analysis, confirmative factor analysis, and reliability test. Results This study was checked the structure of the factors through exploratory factor analysis. also, confirmative factor analysis has shown that all goodness-of-fit indices(TLI, CFI, RMSEA) are at an appropriate level, indicating high configuration feasibility. as a result, a total of seven factors, including career self-understanding, career responsibility, career sustainability, career acceptance, career information exploration and utilization, career autonomy, and career confidence, were developed. Conclusions The study discussed the implications of career development and career education for college students by developing career self-directedness scale.

Towards Career Sustainability: Issues of Women in India

This paper seeks to discuss what makes a sustainable career for a woman in India, how social structures can limit sustainable careers and how the process of socialisation and internalization of social role expectations impact career sustainability. It seeks to highlight ways in which women could have sustainable careers, also called professional growth. This study is based on secondary sources of data collated from a host of research papers and literature published on the subject.India’s statistics on gender equity reflect stark biases. The country’s female labour force participation (LFPR) rate is less than half the world average; Indian women earn only about 65% of what their male counterparts earn (compared to 77% world average). Only a minute fraction of listed companies has women leaders. What creates this skew? What factors influence how careers are shaped and sustained? Using data and findings from diverse sources, including seven India-specific papers, we explore the concept of career sustainability as it relates to Indian women. We examine the effect of social structures such as the primary family unit and the organisation as a gendered construct. We argue that these and other social structures, coupled with women’s internalization of their social role expectations are factors that directly impact the sustainability of women’s careers. Finally, we identify initiatives that can build positive social identities and can mitigate the gendered nature of organizations and society at large.

Encouraging China’s College Students to Achieve Sustainable Careers: Evidence from Structural Equation Modeling

China’s college graduates are experiencing extreme employment pressure, especially under the effects brought about by COVID-19. This study examines whether career-related psychological factors jointly affect college students’ career decision-making self-efficacy (CDMSE) to achieve sustainable career development. Leveraging self-administrated survey data with 703 undergraduate students, we find that career awareness, job search self-efficacy (JSSE), and career planning ability positively relate to CDMSE. We also find that career awareness positively correlates with JSSE and career planning ability. In addition, the results support that perceived career reality positively relates to JSSE and career planning ability. However, no evidence indicates the positive relationship between perceived career reality and CDMSE. Furthermore, mediation tests confirm that JSSE and career planning ability partially mediate the relationship between career awareness and CDMSE. Practical implications, limitations, and future directions are also discussed.

The Dynamics of Career Sustainability: A Latent Transition Analysis

As individuals are facing more and more uncertainties and challenges in their career development, building up sustainable careers with balanced health, happiness, and productivity is important for both employers and employees. In the field of career management, however, there are few empirical investigations on career sustainability and its dynamics. Integrating the theoretical framework of sustainable career and person-environment fit theory, the current study uses two-wave longitudinal data (N = 529) to empirically identify the profiles of employees’ career sustainability and further examine the effect of person-environment fit on profile transitions. For each wave of data, Latent Profile Analyses (LPAs) consistently revealed four latent profile classes of employee career sustainability: highly sustainable, health-oriented, performance-oriented, and unsustainable. Moreover, a Latent Transition Analysis (LTA) model indicated that employees with higher person-environment fit were more likely to go through positive transitions in career sustainability; on the contrary, employees with lower person-environment fit were more likely to go through negative transitions in career sustainability. This study enriches the literature on employees’ sustainable careers and further deepens the understanding of career dynamics and sustainability transitions from the perspective of person-environment fit. Also, this study provides practical implications for career management.

Sustainable Careers in Nursing: Focusing on Health, Happiness and Productivity

The purpose of this symposium is to illustrate factors resided on a personal and contextual level that effect the sustainability of a career in the nursing profession. Based on a systematic literature review, a quantitative and two qualitative empirical examinations, the papers refer to the individual level, the work-family intersection, the team and organizational context as well as the institutional context. The opening paper, Proactive Personality, Recovery Experiences, Stress and Turnover Intention of Registered Nurses, will provide insights about workplace demands and the role of proactive behavior on perceived stress of registered nurses based on a quantitative survey. The second paper, a qualitative study entitled “Who is On-Call to Take Care of my Kids?”: The Country and Occupation Contexts Enabling Informal Childcare and Nursing Careers, will explore the way in which nurses with little children manage their work-family balance. The third paper will be a qualitative study on Organizational Resources for Sustainable Careers in Nursing. The final paper Uniformity along the Way: A Scoping Review on basic Structures of Nursing Education in OECD Countries illustrates similarities and differences in nursing education based on a literature review. Altogether, the four papers aim to address a rich variety of individual and contextual layers for sustainable careers in nursing, and after the presentations our discussant is going to reflect on those and will come up with ideas for connecting the insights. Proactive Personality, Recovery Experiences, Stress, and Turnover Intention of Registered Nurses Presenter: Christine Brown Mahoney; Minnesota State U., Mankato Presenter: Marilyn L Fox; Minnesota State U. The Country and Occupation Contexts Enabling Informal Childcare and Nursing Careers Presenter: Wee Chan Au; Newcastle U. Business School Presenter: Melika Shirmohammadi; U. of Houston Presenter: Mina Beigi; Southampton Business School, U. of Southampton Organizational Resources for Sustainable Careers in Nursing Presenter: Markus Latzke; IMC Krems Presenter: Beatrice Van Der Heijden; Radboud U. Nijmegen Presenter: Harald Stummer; UMIT Tirol Presenter: Stephanie Kainrath; UMIT Tirol Uniformity Along the Way: Scoping Review on Basic Structures of Nursing Education in OECD Countries Presenter: Julia Van Kraaij; Radboud U. Medical Center Presenter: Hester Vermeulen; Spaarne Gasthuis Academy Presenter: Catharina Van Oostveen; Erasmus U. Rotterdam