Features of post-modern career development

Abstract

Recent transformational changes influenced changes in the concept of a career. In the beginning of nineteenth century, career was defined as the progressive course of professional activity. As the environment of career development changed, so did the concept of a career. In the first half of the twentieth century, the concept of vocational guidance first appeared in industrialized western societies. Its purpose was to guide people and help them choose their profession. During 1950's, career researchers began advocating the idea that a career is not only a one-time choice of a profession, job or education programme, but instead a life-long process. Vocational guidance was replaced by career guidance and the concept of organizational career became increasingly more common. It was characterized by professional stability, loyalty to one organization, various incentive mechanisms, work longevity, security and other features. Changes in social, economic, demographic, technological and organizational contexts over the last two decades facilitated the birth of the individual career concept. Some claim that the old (organizational) concept of career is no longer relevant in the modern context. Therefore, it must be replaced by a new (individual) concept of career, along with the new forms of career that this concept would entail (the new career (Arnold, Jackson, 1997), the post-corporate career (Peiperl, Baruch, 1997), the intelligent career (Arthur et al.,1995), the protean career (Hall, 1976), and the boundaryless career (Arthur, Rousseau, 1996)). Some authors (Collin, Young, 2000; Cohen, Dearly, Mallon, 2004) think that this approach is still prevalent in career theory. But the penetration and adequacy of the new career concept in the modern context could be criticised on various grounds: cultural, professional, career success indicator, the novelty of the concept, and other. Therefore, the aim of this paper is to analyse the penetration and adequacy of the new concept of a career in the modern context.