Promoting career development in the early years of a person’s life through self and career construction counselling (using an integrated research methodology and approach): a case study

Abstract

This article reports on the value of career construction counselling (adopting integrated research strategies and associated techniques) for a young person. The participant was purposefully selected from several of people who had sought career counselling in a private practice context. An intrinsic, single-case study design was adopted using an interpretative research paradigm, and an integrated research approach was implemented as the research framework. Self and career construction techniques were used to gather data. The findings demonstrate the importance of promoting career development and life design in the early years and underscore the importance of completing developmental tasks proficiently in childhood to motivate young people to set and realize specific goals, make meaning in their lives, and pursue purpose. Future research should investigate the use of the intervention described here in group contexts with diverse young people.

Savickas’ (2011a) metatheoretical career construction theory (CCT), which blends the psychodynamic (narrative or storied; eliciting people’s multiple micro-stories to help them reflect on their autobiographies and identify their major life themes), differential (testing people to see how they differ and find an ‘optimal’ fit between their traits and certain work environments), and developmental (using educational strategies and methods to advance people’s ‘adjustment’) approaches, is relevant in any discussion of early childhood development. Savickas (2011a) maintains that whatever happens during the early years of a person’s life (the first eight years in particular) strongly influences their career-life stories. Career counsellors need to elicit their clients’ multiple micro-, meso-, and macro-stories – which collectively constitute their career-life stories – and then help them make sense (make meaning) of these stories. Career counsellors also need the narrative competence to corroborate clients’ stories, which requires them to draw on (auto)biographical reasoning. Such reasoning always commences by examining clients’ early life-related micro-stories to place these stories in social contexts as these stories promote the reliability, stability, and steadfastness of clients’ sense of self. Most crucially, though, career counsellors need to acquire the capacity to listen for clients’ stories rather than listen to these stories (Savickas, 2016b; Welty, 1998).

Self-construction theory (Guichard, 2005, 2008, 2009) Like CCT, self-construction theory (SCT) concerns key facets of people’s private as well as their career development in the early years of their development (Collin & Guichard, 2011; Guichard, 2005, 2009). From a very early age, children begin to fulfil a wide variety of roles and take part in a broad array of behaviours and dialogues that gradually enable them to pursue meaning and purpose in their lives. Doing so promotes their self-understanding and clarifies their sense of identity.

CCT and SCT provide a viable theoretical foundation for understanding fundamental aspects of work-related behaviour. Moreover, combined, these two theories can furnish career counsellors with a useful career counselling approach and methods to help clients construct themselves and their careers. Active proficiency in passive suffering (Freud, 1963; Savickas, 2011b) is also promoted. In other words, key challenges that clients have had to deal with are addressed actively. Pain that they have (passively) experienced and that they do not want others to experience as well constitutes central life themes, and it is the task of career counsellors to help clients heal themselves while healing others who are suffering similar challenges or painful experiences (Savickas, 2005, 2008).

Objectives of the Study
1. To explore the development requirements of helping children master career development tasks
2. To examine the value of a career counselling process for children entering teenage age
3. To make recommendations of the interventions of adopting and implementing good career counselling for children entering the teenage age.

Research Methodology
A single, explorative, descriptive, intrinsic case study design was used as I was unaware of any other similar cases that I could replicate.

Question 1 (25 Marks)

Referring to the above article, critically analyse the problem that the researcher is trying to solve. Include the following in your response:

a. Discuss the study research purpose.
b. Discuss the research methodology adopted for the study.
c. Discuss the sampling and the data collection techniques adopted for the study.

Question 2 (25 Marks)

The researcher refers to two theories, metatheoretical career construction theory (CCT) and self- construction theory (SCT). Discuss the concept of theory in a research context and the application of these two theories in the study.

Question 3 (25 Marks)

Examine the article and discuss the process of data analysis in research. Furthermore, discuss the data analysis techniques used in the study.

Question 4 (25 Marks)

The study seeks to promote career development in the early years of a person’s life. The researcher indicated that much can be done in the early years to help children master developmental tasks and increase their career adaptability, which is made up of career confidence, career curiosity, career concern, and career control.

Discuss the importance of ethics in research and the ethical considerations that a researcher should consider when conducting this study, taking into account that participants could be children.

Get completed answers on above questions on Computing Methods

Answer 1: An analysis of the given case study indicates that the main problem that the researcher is trying to solve is to identify the ways in which career counselling can be made effective for children during the early stage of life. The focus is on identifying intervention that could help in implementing good career counselling for children entering the teenage age. The mean purpose of the study is therefore to evaluate the ways in which children can master career development tasks.