Employees’ career mindsets as career capital for a digital work world orientation

Abstract

Orientation: Employees need to develop career capital for an open-minded work world orientation in an unpredictable, rapidly evolving digital-era work world in which jobs and occupational pathways have become blurred and uncertain.

Research purpose: This research empirically examined the extent to which distance learning employees’ career mindsets as career capital predicted facets of their digital-era work world orientation.

Motivation for the study: The construct of work world orientation is empirically under-researched and the association between employees’ career mindsets, work world awareness and competency including their higher education studies’ contribution to their work world readiness is unclear.

Research approach/design and method: Data were collected from (N = 486) full-time employed open- and distance-learning undergraduate students. Regression analysis and structural equation modelling (SEM) were applied in the cross-sectional, quantitative study.

Main findings: The results revealed the protean (pure challenge) career mindset as important ‘knowing why’ career capital to positively predict participants’ digital work world awareness, work world competency and work world readiness.

Practical/managerial implications: The study highlighted the importance of the protean (pure challenge) career mindset in the career development learning of employees to better prepare them for the digital-era work world.

Contribution/value-add: The study enriched understanding of the implicit role of employees’ ‘knowing why’ career capital in their approach-motivation towards important digital-era ‘knowing what’ career capital.