Understanding and addressing unequal career opportunities in the ‘new career’ era: an analysis of the role of structural career boundaries and organizational career management

Abstract

By bringing together the literature on 'new careers', career boundaries and organizational career management (OCM), on different social identity groups, and on diversity management, this article aims to contribute to debates on unequal career opportunities and career boundaries in the 'new career' era. First, it develops propositions on the way structural career boundaries involving qualifications and labour market scripts contribute to unequal opportunities to share in the promises of the 'new career' discourse. We specifically argue that these boundaries affect the careers of different social identity groups to different degrees because common sense views of 'ideal' qualifications and 'ideal' labour market scripts are infused with social identities. Second, this article develops propositions on the way different types of OCM practices address career boundaries and whether they can contribute to equal opportunities. We argue that traditional OCM practices will only result in equal opportunities if common sense views of 'ideal' qualifications and 'ideal' labour market scripts are changed. Finally, we propose that incorporating inclusive common sense views of qualifications and labour market scripts in bundles of OCM practices enables these to effectively contribute to equal career opportunities.

Career implications of career shocks through the lens of gender: the role of the academic career script

“…First, organizations guide career choices and behavior by setting formal and informal rules that embody ingrained institutional views on career progression (Van Laer et al. , 2019), so-called career scripts.…”

“…First, organizations guide career choices and behavior by setting formal and informal rules that embody ingrained institutional views on career progression (Van Laer et al, 2019), so-called career scripts. These scripts entail the collective shared interpretation of successful careers in a profession (Laudel et al, 2019) and become for instance visible in the conditions set out in promotions systems.…”

“…To unravel the role of context in more depth, we explore career shock implications through the lens of gender. For individuals with specific social identities in the workplace, such as women, traditional career success notions are experienced as challenging to deal with (Acker, 2006; Van Laer et al. , 2019).…”

“…To unravel the role of context in more depth, we explore career shock implications through the lens of gender. For individuals with specific social identities in the workplace, such as women, traditional career success notions are experienced as challenging to deal with (Acker, 2006;Van Laer et al, 2019). Attention for gender differences is especially crucial in the academic context, which is often characterized by practices of hegemonic masculinity (Bleijenbergh et al, 2013;O'Connor et al, 2021).…”

Organizational career management in the new career era: scale development and validation

“…2019), organizational commitment (Soares and Mosquera 2021) and organizational performance (De Vos and Cambre 2017). Several scholars highlight the possible dark sides of OCM, such as the idea that if commonsense views of ‘ideal’ qualifications and ‘ideal’ labor market scripts are not changed, OCM will result in unequal opportunities (Van Laer, Verbruggen and Janssens 2019), individuals' unmet expectations, increased competition among program participants (Granrose and Portwood 1987), loss of good employees through movement to other employers (Gutteridge and Otte 1983) and greater turnover due to an increase in individuals' perceived employability (de Oliveira et al. 2019).…”