The aim of this paper is to investigate the ways in attachment to work and continuing learning act as influences on career stability and career transitions for individuals in a range of different settings

Methodology

This paper draws upon two major data sources: interviews and longitudinal tracking. The first data source comes from the narrative biographies collected from narrative interviews carried out across a number of projects and focusing upon the development of learning, careers and identities at work. The biographies were constructed from the following individual or group interviews:

• two group interviews with nurses and radiographers in health care

• individual interviews with workers in engineering, IT, telecommunications and healthcare

• individual interviews with workers who had undertaken mid-career professional development (Master’s programmes)

• individual interviews with workers in permanent relationships where the worker or their partner were involved in long-distance commuting.

Some of the above were interviewed on a single occasion, whereas contact was maintained with others over a period of several years. These interviews were almost exclusively conducted with those in work, although occasionally we did interview workers who had been made redundant, were on a ‘career break’ or who were in transition in other ways. The second data source, however, was complementary in that it involved the longitudinal tracking of individuals using a variety of career guidance services and in this way we were able to pick up on adults who were not in employment. The longitudinal study involved initial interviews with clients after they participated in a careers guidance session and then follow-up interviews one, two, three and four years later. [There will also be one more rounds of interviews, so the individuals will have been tracked in total for five years.]

Findings

We have narrative biographies of over one hundred adults, who were either employees or who were seeking employment and/or to change their careers. One way of reporting on the development of work-related learning, careers and identities of older workers is to think in terms of strategic action.  The experiences of individuals could be mapped in terms of their patterns of relationships, orientation and adaptive response to work and it is possible to trace the dynamic development of their characteristic repertoires of strategic action - their ‘strategic biographies’.

From the data sources it was possible to construct ‘strategic biographies’ of people in work, who had been made redundant, had taken a ‘career break’ or who were in transition. We will draw out some thematic issues but we will also focus upon cases that exemplify different patterns of behaviour in the development of work-related learning, careers and identities. Four forms of strategic action that individuals may have in relation to their current work could be identified: identification; adjustment; transition (in the development of a strategic career); and redefinition (of role or personal orientation).

We examined two dimensions of interviewees’ response to challenges of development of their learning, careers and identities from either a position of continuing employment, seeking a career change or if they were currently not in work. The first is the extent of their attachment to work (whether they identify with their work or offer more constrained commitment) and the second is the nature of the opportunities they had for, and their approach to, learning and development.

Interestingly a strong attachment, or adjustment, to a current work role could act as a career ‘anchor’ from which it was possible for individuals to continue their career development (e.g. through willingness to engage in ‘upskilling’) or else as a ‘chain’ that restricted their perceived freedom of action (e.g. through unwillingness to engage in substantive ‘upskilling’ or ‘reskilling’). Guidance helped individuals manage career transitions by helping clients view their current skill sets as ‘anchors’ that can be taken with them on a journey and utilised in a new setting, rather than as ‘chains’ that hold them close to their current roles.  

Theoretical and educational significance

The representation of the relationship between individuals and the work-related roles they perform as patterns of strategic action in terms of their relationships, orientation and adaptive response to work is a valuable analytical tool. It enables analysis of challenges of development of individual learning, careers and identities to be linked to attachment, or adjustment, to current work roles and the extent to which attachment can act as a career ‘anchor’ from which it was possible for individuals to continue their career development (e.g. through willingness to engage in ‘upskilling’) or else as a ‘chain’ that restricted their perceived freedom of action (e.g. through unwillingness to engage in substantive ‘upskilling’ or ‘reskilling’).