Career Choices

For the past few weeks, there is this question which I have been mulling over - Why do people make the career choices they make?.

I frequently find students making career choices on basis of elimination. ‘I am studying Commerce because I don’t like Science’. ‘I want to do Marketing because I don’t like numbers – hence Finance doesn’t suit me.’ I find this process of selecting something because other options are not acceptable intriguing. But then maybe that’s a reflection of our maturation process. We first figure out what we don’t want. Some of us, over time, manage to realize what we want. Even amongst those who realize what they want, a miniscule number seem to be able to gather the energy to pursue what their dream.

Edgar Schein does talk about 8 Career Anchors – Technical/Functional Competence, General Managerial Competence, Autonomy/Independence, Security/Stability, Entrepreneurial Creativity, Service/Dedication to a Cause, Pure Challenge, and Lifestyle.

But I find Edgar Schein’s model static. I don’t feel it captures the intra-personal and individual-environment dynamics involved when a person makes a career decision.

As per Schein’s model every individual has a Career Anchor which influences how the person makes his/her career choices. Let’s say a person has Pure Challenge as his Career Anchor. Does it mean that he would always opt to work in jobs which have Pure Challenge irrespective of other costs involved?

There are a number of things which are important to us at any point of time. These would be all or a combination of the 8 different career anchors. We may value them differently. So it’s perfectly possible that I may have Entrepreneurial Creativity as a Career Anchor but that doesn’t mean I would take up an Entreprenurial Creative role which has no Lifestyle or Security involved.

There are some things which are important for us at the hygiene level. Then there are other things which are motivators for us. What constitutes hygiene factors and what constitutes motivational factors is individual dependent. So money may be a motivational factor for one person while being a hygiene factor for others.

I feel our Career Decisions are based on an evaluation of what motivates us given presence of minimum acceptable quantity of hygiene factors. Take away hygiene factors and relevant career option would not be acceptable anymore.

Hence what is applicable to an individual is a network of career anchors – some of which are hygiene factors and some of which are motivation factors. The minimum acceptable levels of different hygiene factors might change from time to time. Preference order of motivators may change from time to time. Given presence of hygiene factors, we would work towards maximizing our motivational factors.

Also, this entire network of career anchors for an individual exists within the larger phenomenal field within which an individual lives. It hence influences and is influenced by this phenomenal field. Only if we were to accept this, would we be able to make sense of those situations when an individual takes career decisions which can’t only be explained by his network of career anchors.

As individuals what we can do is to reflect on the times we have taken critical career decisions, to understand what our career hygiene and motivation factors are. As Managers we should encourage our team members to engage in similar reflections.

Answers may not be straightforward, but the journey itself may be revealing and fulfilling.

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Sourav