NICE HANDBOOK – Academic training of Career ... - Nice-network.eu

8.3. Life Design Perspective – The Role ofContext and ActionJacques PouyaudOne of the most notable evolutions of societies nowadays is their instability. Numerous authorshave pointed out that our current “fluid” environment (in reference to liquid modernitydescribed by Bauman, 2000, 2007) leads people to be more and more dependent of contextualchanges, and confronted with the permanent task of facing uncertainty. To cope with thisinstability, adaptability and identity are presented as major individual resources (Savickas,2011). These two dimensions can be seen as meta-competences which incorporate multipleresources used by individuals for strategically constructing their lives in relation to their individualcontexts.career management issues. According to a constructivist perspective, they have to becomelife designing counsellors (Savickas, Nota, Rossier, Dauwalder, Duarte, Guichard, Soresi, vanEsbroeck, van Vianen, & Bigeon, 2010). This means that they need to investigate the contributionof any commitment in work or in other life domains regarding how their clients gainmeaning for their lives. They also need to support their clients in reflecting the functionalityof their actions in these commitments behind this background. More generally, they have toconsider life designing factors and processes – notably the reflexivity processes engaged in vialanguage and action – as the heart of their interventions. In considering such a constructivistconstructionistperspective, CGC professionals don’t need to abandon their positivist practicesand concepts, but they have to reinvest them for the meaning they can construct together withtheir clients regarding how they interact with their contexts.Dealing with identity questions in counselling interviewsSpecifically for career questions, the meta-competence of adaptability can be described as thecombination of four resources (4C’) which individuals need to develop: concern, control, curiosityand confidence (Savickas, 1997; Porfeli & Savickas, 2012). According to Savickas (2005),“the adaptive individual is conceptualized as becoming concerned about the vocational future,taking control of trying to prepare for one‘s vocational future, displaying curiosity by exploringpossible selves and future scenarios, and strengthening the confidence to pursue one’s aspirations” (p. 52). These resources are then described as “adapt-abilities”.Focusing career counselling on self construction via adaptability and identity processes seemsto fit well with the principal tool used by career counsellors: the interview. If identity is mostlya narrative, interviews can be the major key for supporting clients’ self construction. A firstchallenge for the field of career guidance and counselling is then to develop interview methodologies,based on a strong theoretical foundation, that permit a reflection of identity viareflexivity. A growing body of research and practices already exists (Guichard, 2008; Savickas,2011).NICE HandbookOther psychological dimensions such as “planned happenstance” or “serendipity” (Mitchell,Levin, & Krumboltz, 1999; Merton & Barber, 2004) can also contribute to peoples’ developmentof adaptability. Finally, more classic concepts often related to career issues can also belinked to adapt-abilities: Self-efficacy (Bandura, 1977; Lent, Brown, & Hackett, 1994), decision-makingprocess (Gati, 1986; Peterson, Sampson, Lenz, & Reardon, 2002) are surely themost studied concepts, but career exploration, pro-activity, or the ability to plan for the futurecan also be considered (Brown and Bimrose, 2011).The second major resource is identity. Identity is often presented as a constructed speechabout oneself (see for example the theory of “subjective identity forms” proposed by Jean Guichard,2009). Recently, narrative approaches in counselling offer a practical way of dealingwith identity processes as strategies for career construction (Cochran, 1999; McMahon & Watson,2011). Through narratives, individuals can create meanings and construct a sense of causalityand continuity of their own careers, lives and identities.What consequences for career counsellors?A second challenge refers to the importance of taking into account multiple life contexts. Thismeans accepting that career processes are complex and holistically defined. Because practicesalso need to be adapted to a broad range of clients and various situations it is necessary toapply a contextual perspective. With this perspective, the career interview aims to supportclients in developing a reflexive ability to construct a sense of self on the basis of multiplecommitments.But the third and more difficult challenge is perhaps to help clients in making this construction“real”. Young and Domene (2011) point out that it is also “in acting that we construct our lives,including our career life” (p. 30). Even if identity elaboration during interview is important, itis not sufficient for “constructing our lives” in reality. Several useful theoretical models existwhich can help us to understand how self construction can be realized through action (Agency,Bandura, 1986; Goal Directed Action and Contextual Action Theory, Young & Domene, 2011;Young, Valach & Domene, 2005; Young, Valach & Collin, 2002). Yet, there is still a lack of careercounselling practices centred on identity that combine action and reflexivity. A major challengefor CGC professionals is perhaps to permit clients to reflect how they construct their identitiesthrough their concrete actions.Trends and DevelopmentsOne major consequence of these new trends in the field of career guidance and counsellingis that CGC professionals can less and less confine themselves to deal only with their clients’152 153