No abstract

Southern European countries, like Italy and Spain, have been severely affected by the recent economic crisis. This has affected their labour market in terms of increased unemployment, while many of those in employment feel more insecure. As a consequence, many individuals turn to education as a step to making a career change. The opportunities and hindrances stemming from socio-economic institutions such as vocational education and training (VET) and higher education, labour market regulations and career guidance are highly influential in the ways in which individuals manage their career transitions and engage in lifelong learning. This article outlines the structural conditions in the two countries in respect to career guidance provision and reflects, based on individual accounts of mid-career workers, how individuals negotiate the system

The article is aimed at analysing the qualitative interviews (in the form of short life stories) carried out within the Learning and Career Paths (LCP) project in Italy. Theories, such as those of reflexivity, agency, self-construction, competencies, and transformation put forward by relevant authors in the sociological and educational field, are used as a conceptual framework to review a limited but significant number of individual experiences. In particular, Archer's model of reflexive types helps in going through the conducts of interviewed subjects (which were 21 in total), guided by reflexive stances. Such behaviours are very individual-specific, but they are all converging towards a more or less successful self-identity construction that allows an employment status, as well as kinds of satisfaction and social recognition. Such a construction seems reinforced in the different cases by an active, intentional, self-development of competencies whose specific, practice-based components are underpinned by fundamental cognitive, social and emotional components (according to Boyatzis' scheme), continuously nurtured by formal and experiential learning. The research outcomes illustrated in the article mainly regard the subjective, 'agentic', sides of individual behaviours. They are intended as having some relevance for new development hypotheses in the field of lifelong career guidance (LLCG), whose policies and practices should be increasingly focused on the specificities of individual trajectories.

In experiential learning, on-field experience needs to be processed consciously in order for learning to take place. Reflection plays a crucial role by providing a bridge between practical experience and conceptualization. Despite being a protected environment, university traineeship is a form of experiential learning that offers students a chance to learn from the fields and reflect on a possible future profession. In this paper we present and discuss a research project whose goal is the development of a methodology to educate trainees’ reflective thinking and writing

In Italy today, as in most European countries, young college graduates start their careers facing very fragmented professional paths, often characterised by short contracts and many transitions. In the current socio-economic situation, where career transitions have replaced job security and individuals struggle to search for meaning and purpose in a 'puzzle' made of multiple work and life experiences, social institutions no longer provide the norms with which people used to answer the questions of 'How shall I live?' and 'How should I design my life to achieve my aspirations? ' (Savickas, 2015). Today individuals are bound to answer these questions by building their own life and career projects, trying to give a sense of purpose to the many choices that compose a career. This process can generate anxiety and a sense of uncertainty. It demands that workers learn how to adapt to fluid societies and flexible organizations without losing the 'thread' that connects many episodes into their unique career story. How can a counselor effectively support young graduates to navigate our 'liquid modernity' (Bauman, 2000) and fluid job market, guiding him/her towards educative experiences and continuous learning? This paper comments data collected during career counseling meetings with Italian university students and graduates in the first half of 2016 and describes the approach adopted by counselors to help them build a professional identity from many and different work experiences, as if they were the tiles of a mosaic.