The Changing Career Strategies

Introduction

 

In the late 1980s and the first half of the 1990s many organizations responded to the more competitive transnational economy by undertaking significant restructuring and organizational adjustment. These changes, that have helped to shape the current political, economic and employment cultures being experienced, are well documented. A major consequence of this activity has for the old certainties that attached to employment to be challenged. It is believed that there have also been changes in the values of employees and in particular managers that affect the way in which they now perceive their own career and how they chose to manage it.

 

This shift in social values has led to different expectations concerning how work should be organized, and what form of expectation and relationship the individuals have with work and the organization that employs them. Research conducted in 1995 by Benbow revealed that 90 per cent of large employers have restructured over the previous five years, with 66 per cent having shed at least one layer of management, 40 per cent expected to restructure in 1996 and 60 per cent expected to do so again. Of those restructuring, 75 per cent expect there would be job losses at all management levels. It is evident that organizations are becoming less hierarchical and flatter.

 

Within this pattern it is likely that individuals could experience several job changes brought about by a variety of circumstances, this will mean, at a practical level, that people will be less able to plan each career move long in advance. In a more dynamic, less certain employment market they will need to develop different decision-making approaches based on the continuous updating of skills to maximize their ability to respond to each employment opportunity as it arises. Equally, as organizations are unable to provide organizational careers for individuals, they also have to realign their thinking. Organizations are now offering opportunities for individuals to develop their skills and competences to increase their marketability or employability. This will have to be done while responding to the employers in the market as they determine and redefine their needs. Apparently there has been a shift from the deliberate development of people to match the organization’s goals to an approach, which emphasizes the individual’s responsibility for their own career development.