BE SMART ABOUT IT (RE)INTEGRATING WORK AND CAREERS

Jos Akkermans – Seminar Tilburg University 19-11-2015

Jos Akkermans Assistant Professor of HRM and OB @ VU Amsterdam

Board Member NFMD; Director ACCR MAIN RESEARCH EXPERTISE & INTEREST (Re)Integration of research on work and careers. Topics include career

competencies, job crafting, employability, and “smart jobs”.

Interaction between Individual Career Management (ICM) and Organizational Career Management (OCM). How do they enhance and/or diminish each other? Career management paradox?

School-to-Work Transition. Building theory on the transition of graduates to the labor market in the “new career” landscape.

TODAY’S MAIN TAKE-HOME MESSAGES

LOOKING BACK Hall & Las Heras (2010): (re)integrate work and careers Akkermans et al. (2013; 2015): career competencies as accelerants of

employability ánd work engagement

HERE AND NOW Career competencies and job crafting as basis for enhanced employability

and W-H Balance Career competencies and job crafting as basis for job satisfaction and

work engagement Career crafting: a new concept

LOOKING FORWARD (i.e., discussion time) Careers as shared responsibility between I and O

PART 1 – LOOKING BACK

Hall & Las Heras (2010)

(Re)Integrate

Work & Careers

(RE)INTEGRATING WORK & CAREERS

Who has followed this call until now? Surprisingly few researchers! Some studies on perceived employability and work engagement

Our answer Career competencies as personal resources Increasing integrating between work and career implies that developing

yourself in one domain may spill over to the other one

SO WHAT ARE CAREER COMPETENCIES ANYWAY?

Career Competencies

Reflective Competencies

Communicative Competencies

Behavioral Competencies

Reflection on Motivation

Reflection on Qualities

Networking

Self-Profiling

Work Exploration

Career Control

CAREER COMPETENCIES

Akkermans et al. (2013; 2015)

(RE)INTEGRATING WORK & CAREERS

Akkermans et al. (2013 in JCD) Validation of CCQ CC associated with perceived employability, self-efficacy, performance

Akkermans et al. (2013 in JVB) Career competencies may act similar to personal resources in JD-R model Interplay between CC and job resources to enhance work engagement

Akkermans et al. (2015 in HRM) Intervention focused on enhancing career competencies worked well… … and increased CC resulted in enhanced employability perceptions +

work engagement

PART 2 – HERE AND NOW

STUDY 1

Career Competencies T1

Job Crafting T1

Internal Perceived Employability T2

External Perceived Employability T2

Work-Home Interference T2

Work-Home Enrichment T2

STUDY 1: THEORY GAP & “AHA” Understand how CC is linked to outcomes in several domains Integration between work, career, and life domain in 1 study

Job crafting

Increasing Structural & Social

Resources

Increasing Challenges

Reducing Hindrances

Autonomy

Support

Projects

Additional tasks

Cognitive demands

Emotional demands

JOB CRAFTING

Bron: Tims et al. (2012; 2013; 2014)

Perceived Employability

Internal

External

PE & W-H INTERACTION

Work-Home Interaction

Interference

Enrichment

STUDY 1: THEORY GAP & “AHA” Understand how CC is linked to outcomes in several domains Integration between work, career, and life domain in 1 study

Career Construction Theory (Savickas, 2005) Competencies Behavior Development Crystallization Specialization Actualization

Spillover Models (Greenhaus & Powell, 2006) So far: spillover between work and home We argue: spillover between work, career, and home

STUDY 1: METHOD 2-WAVE DATASET Total matched N=183 Approximately 1 month in-between measurement moments

DEMOGRAPHIC CHARACTERISTICS 59.4% female; 35.47 hours per week Young employees

STRATEGY OF ANALYSIS Latent variable SEM with AMOS 21

STUDY 1: RESULTS BASIC FINDINGS Reducing hindering demands did not fit latent JC factor Correlations all in the expected directions

CC JC EPE & IPE Job crafting does mediate between CC and EPE Job crafting does not mediate between CC and IPE

CC JC WHI & WHE Job crafting does mediate between CC & WHI Job crafting does mediate between CC & WHE

STUDY 1: RESULTS

STUDY 1: DISCUSSION INTEGRATION OF RESEARCH ON WORK AND CAREERS Heed the call of Hall and Las Heras (2010) First study to show a positive link between CC and JC

EXTENSION OF CAREER CONSTRUCTION THEORY Not only applicable to career adaptability Theory applicable for integration between work and careers

EXTENSION OF SPILLOVER MODELS Spillover not only between work and home domains Three-way spillover: work, career, ánd home

STUDY 2

Core Self-Evaluations

Job Crafting

Job Satisfaction

Work Engagement

Job Resources

Career Competencies

STUDY 2: THEORY GAP & “AHA” Understand how CSE can influence positive work-related outcomes Three proposed paths: perception, action, development Addition of more active outcome: work engagement

STUDY 2: THEORY

Core Self-Evaluations

Job Crafting

Job Satisfaction

Work Engagement

Job Resources

Career Competencies

Self Esteem Self-efficacy Locus of Control Emotional Stability

STUDY 2: THEORY GAP & “AHA” Understand how CSE can influence positive work-related outcomes Three proposed paths: perception, action, development Addition of more active outcome: work engagement

CSE (Judge et al., 1997) Extant literature shows direct and indirect effects of CSE on outcomes Evidence for perception path; action path not tested; development path new

JOB DEMANDS-RESOURCES MODEL (Demerouti et al., 2001) Perceptions of job characteristics are related to outcomes Actually changing job characteristics is related to outcomes Development as a personal resources related to outcomes

STUDY 1: METHOD 2 STUDIES German sample (N=303) Dutch sample (N=404)

DEMOGRAPHIC CHARACTERISTICS GER: 26.6% female; 34.7 hours per week NL: 40.4% female; 33.6 hours per week Young employees (Mage=24/26)

STRATEGY OF ANALYSIS Latent variable SEM with AMOS 21

STUDY 2: PERCEPTION PATH CSE related positively to autonomy and support (both

samples), however, only support related significantly to work engagement (sample 2)

Social support

Core self-evaluations

Work engagement

Job satisfaction Autonomy

.23**/.31**

.23**/.36**

.11†/.02

.09†/.03

.28**/.28**

.09†/.22**

STUDY 2: ACTION PATH CSE related positively to job crafting (both samples), job

crafting related significantly to work engagement (both samples)

Job crafting Core self-

evaluations

Work engagement

Job satisfaction

.40**/.45**

.11/.17*

.38**/.25**

STUDY 2: DEVELOPMENT PATH CSE related positively to career competencies (both samples),

career competencies related to work engagement (both samples)

Career competencies

Core self-evaluations

Work engagement

Job satisfaction

.71**/.69**

.23†/-.08

.44**/.19*

STUDY 1: DISCUSSION CONFIRMATION OF THREE PROPOSED PATHS Support for all three paths, including the previously untested ones Surprising: work engagement not an outcome of perception path

NEW PATHS ACTIVE OUTCOME Both job crafting and career competencies related to WE Both not (or barely) related to job satisfaction

FUNDAMENTALLY DIFFERENT PROCESSES Perception path = passive = satisfaction Action & Development = (pro)active = engagement

STUDY 3: CAREER CRAFTING

CAREER CRAFTING

DEFINITION OF CAREER CRAFTING “Proactive behavior that individuals perform to self-manage their

career, which is aimed at attaining optimal career-related outcomes”

ADDED VALUE OF CAREER CRAFTING It is more active and specific than career competencies It is related to long-term career development, that is increasing

person-career fit, rather than person-job fit (i.e., job crafting)

STUDY 3: CAREER CRAFTING

CAREER CRAFTING

Reflective Crafting

Communicative Crafting

Proactive Crafting

STUDY 3: PRELIM FINDINGS RELIABILITY All between .86 - .88 for the three scales in sample 1 (N=361) and

sample 2 (N=491)

EFA Clearly two different factors for career crafting versus competencies Clearly two different factors for career crafting versus job crafting

REGRESSIONS Career crafting as predictor of external and internal PE Career crafting as predictor of subjective career success

REWIND: SO WHAT?! WORK AND CAREER ARE INHERENTLY INTEGRATED And this trend will continue even more

CAREER COMPETENCIES AND JOB CRAFTING AS EXAMPLE They relate to personality traits (e.g., CSE, proactivity) They relate to outcomes in several domains (i.e., work, career, life) They relate to each other

CAREER CRAFTING AS A WAY TO GO FORWARD Proactive behaviors aimed at long-term development Building block for “SMART jobs” (job design of the future now)

PART 3 – LO

OKIN

G FO

RWARD

DISCUSSION TIME (RE)INTEGRATING WORK AND CAREERS Any ideas how to further shape this research agenda? Which opportunities for integration between these domains

would be worthwhile to pursue? … or doesn’t it make sense at all to you?

CAREERS AS SHARED RESPONSIBILITY We seem to have forgotten the organization in the debate on

career development. But careers happen in context. How does the perpetual need for proactivity match with what

goes on in terms of HR policies and appraisal systems? And what about the “career management paradox”?

j.akkermans@vu.nl

SMART JOBS

SMART JOBS

Hackman & Oldham (2010): “the very thing job design researchers study is being transformed”

NEW WAYS TO DESIGN ORGANIZATIONS Network organizations, cross-functional teams, etc.

NEW WAYS TO ORGANIZE WORK I-deals, more flexible job descriptions, crafting, etc.

SMART JOBS

Hackman & Oldham (2010): “the very thing job design researchers study is being transformed”

ORGANIZE WORK SO THAT EMPLOYEES PERFORM ÁND LEARN Passend in de huidige arbeidsmarkt en organisatie

DEVELOP “TRANSFERABLE COMPETENCIES” Thereby creating both internal ánd external employability And maintaining this over time: sustainable employability

INSTRUMENTS STUDY 1 Career competencies: 21 items (Akkermans et al., 2013)

“I can clearly see what my passions are in my work” Job crafting: 21 items (Tims et al., 2012)

“I make sure that I use my capacities to the fullest” Perceived employability: 8 items (Akkermans et al., 2013; De Cuyper et al., 2012)

“In my current job, I am available for performing different types of tasks”

“I would find another job rather quickly if I would search for it” Work-Home Interaction: 8 items (Geurts et al., 2005)

“How often does it happen that your work schedule makes it difficult for you to fulfil your domestic obligations?”

“How often does it happen that you manage your time at home more efficiently as a result of the way you do your job?”

INSTRUMENTS STUDY 2 CSE: 12 items (Judge et al., 2002)

“I am confident I get the success I deserve in life” Autonomy: 3 items (Bakker et al., 2003)

“Can you decide on your own how your work is executed?” Support: 3 items (Bakker et al., 2003)

“If necessary, my supervisor helps me with a certain task” Job crafting: 21 items (Tims et al., 2012)

“I make sure that I use my capacities to the fullest” Career competencies: 21 items (Akkermans et al., 2013)

“I can clearly see what my passions are in my work” Job satisfaction: 3 items (Cook et al., 1981)

“I am satisfied with my current work” Work engagement: 9 items (Schaufeli et al., 2006)

“I am enthusiastic about my job”