Paradigms, Practices and Policies to Foster Sustainable and Meaningful Careers

Dear colleagues,

The recent scientific literature shows the wide and frequent use of the term “sustainability” in the fields of work and organizational psychology, vocational psychology and career counseling. Indeed, during the last decades, fast and ongoing technological, social and economic changes have affected the nature of work and the demands of the labor market. Moreover, global environmental threats have also highlighted the necessity for different industrial models, new professional skills and new ways of working. As a consequence, career paths have become more uncertain and unpredictable, marked by complex and somewhat disruptive transitions, which can put certain groups or individuals at risk of exclusion from decent and dignified employment opportunities (Massoudi et al., 2018).

In such a landscape, individuals are faced with new challenges and demands in terms of life-long education and continuous adaptation, when struggling to achieve sustained employability and develop meaningful and sustainable careers. To grasp this new reality, researchers and practitioners also need to develop new paradigms and interventions to help individuals reconcile their personal needs and aspirations with their commitment to social responsibility and global wellbeing (McDonald et Hite, 2018).

Recently, authors have proposed new theoretical models or intervention methods to develop knowledge on sustainability from a career perspective. For instance, Cohen-Scali and colleagues stressed the importance of implementing evidence-based and inclusive “career and life design interventions which contribute to a fair and sustainable development” (p. 5, Cohen-Scali et al., 2018), whereas Lent and Brown (2020) proposed an intervention model to support life-long career decision-making and foster career sustainability. Moreover, De Vos and colleagues (2020) proposed a theoretical framework and an integrative research agenda, referring to sustainable careers as patterns of work experiences through time and at the intersection of different social spaces, characterized by individual agency and personal meaning. Finally, Chin et al. (2021) have developed a measure of the core features of sustainable careers as being resourceful, flexible, renewable and integrative.

Despite these scholarly attempts to define career sustainability, this construct is still in its early stages of development. Future research is thus needed to achieve a more comprehensive and integrated understanding of it from micro (i.e., individuals behaviors and needs), meso (i.e., organizational and institutional roles) and macro (i.e., national and international policies and incentives) perspectives.

To address such needs, this Special Issue invites the submission of high-quality conceptual and empirical papers in order to investigate the complementarity of these various conceptualizations and bring empirical support to them. In summation, this Special Issue puts the focus on:

• Sustainable development of individuals through life-long education
• Career choices in line with a fair and sustainable development of our societies
• Career interventions aiming to facilitate equal access to decent and meaningful work
• Organizational interventions promoting employees’ well-being and sustainable careers
• Public policies and labor market measures to foster sustained employability

Proposed Deadline:

Abstract submission deadline: May 30, 2022
Notification of abstract acceptance: July 15, 2022
Full article submission deadline: November 30, 2022

References

Chin, T., Jawahar, I. M., & Li, G. (2021). Development and Validation of a Career Sustainability Scale. Journal of Career Development. Advanced online publication. https://doi.org/10.1177/0894845321993234

Cohen-Scali, V., Guchard, J., Aisenson, G., Moumoula, I.A.,  Pouyaud, J., Drabik-Podgórna, V., Podgórny, M. & Bernaud, (2018).  The UNESCO Life Long Career Counseling Chair Project: Main purposes and Implemented Actions. In V. Cohen-Scali, J. Pouyaud, M. Podgórny, V. Drabik-Podgórna, G. Aisenson, J.-L. Bernaud,… J. Guichard (Eds.). Interventions in Career Design and Education Transformation for Sustainable Development and Decent Work (pp. 1–11). Cham, Switzerland: Springer / UNESCO Chair on Life Long Guidance and Counseling.

De Vos, A., Van Der Heijden, B. I., & Akkermans, J. (2020). Sustainable careers: Towards a conceptual model. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 117. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jvb.2018.06.01102.x

Lent, R. W., & Brown, S. D. (2020). Career decision making, fast and slow: Toward an integrative model of intervention for sustainable career choice. Journal of Vocational Behavior. Advanced online publication. https://doi.org/10.1177/0894845321993234

Massoudi, K., Abessolo, M., Atitsogbe, K. A., Banet, E., Bollmann, G., Dauwalder, J.-P.,… Rossier, J. (2018). A Value-Centered Approach to Decent Work. In V. Cohen-Scali, J. Pouyaud, M. Podgórny, V. Drabik-Podgórna, G. Aisenson, J.-L. Bernaud,… J. Guichard (Eds.). Interventions in Career Design and Education Transformation for Sustainable Development and Decent Work (pp. 93–110). Cham, Switzerland: Springer / UNESCO Chair on Life Long Guidance and Counseling.

McDonald, K. S., & Hite, L. M. (2018). Conceptualizing and creating sustainable careers. Human Resource Development Review, 17, 349–372. https://doi.org/10.1177/1534484318796318

Dr. Koorosh Massoudi
Shagini Udayar
Guest Editors

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