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PurposeRecent studies on contingent workers highlight their boundaryless and protean nature, and depict them as free agents who reject organisational forms of career support. Going beyond such current view, this paper aims to shed light on the career support provided by labour market intermediaries (LMIs) to skilled contingent workers (SCWs), the latter known as freelancers and consulting firms' employees.Design/methodology/approachUsing a qualitative stance and an inductive approach, the authors draw on 33 interviews to grasp SCWs' discourses on the career support offered by LMIs, and their account managers. The thematic analysis reveals two main themes: the career support delivered by LMIs to SCWs, and the expectations of SCWs regarding potential additional forms of career support from LMIs.FindingsThe authors show that SCWs are supported by LMIs in their career via a number of career management practices and operational support, and account managers a likely to play a key role in the careers of SCWs by providing transactional and relational career support. Moreover, the authors stress that SCWs are free agents, yet seeking for forms of support from LMIs.Originality/valueThe present paper addresses the roles of LMIs regarding non-standard population of workers through the lens of SCWs, what has barely been undertaken in recent research. This paper also enriches current debates on the organisational support SCWs are willing to accept and benefit from, despite the idiosyncratic nature of their careers.

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Project-based forms of work have been steadily increasing in all sorts of organizations, which has led scholars to investigate their effects on career development and career management practices. However, disciplinary and conceptual divides have prevented comprehensive conceptualizations of project workers' careers to emerge to this day. Building on an integrative literature review, the paper underlines the predominance of individual-centred research designs giving pride of place to project managers, at the expense of organizational-centred studies accounting for the multiple stakeholders involved in project workers' careers. Five research perspectives on project work and careers are highlighted: Project work may be studied under the prism of career management, career transitions, career orientations, career advantages, and role transitions. The review is concluded with a comprehensive framework articulating project work and careers. The paper ultimately pleads for further investigation of project work and careers from a multistakeholder and organizational perspective.

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