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The protean and boundaryless career concepts have dominated recent career research. Demographic groups are posited to differ on these “new career orientations,” with implications for career development and social equity. The purpose of this paper is to test these hypotheses by systematically reviewing research on demographic differences in new career orientations.

This paper meta-analyzes demographic differences in protean, boundaryless, and proactive career orientations using data from 29,605 individuals (74 samples).

Demographic differences in new career orientations are generally negligible to small, with organizational mobility preferences showing the largest differences across demographic characteristics. Age showed curvilinear relations with new career orientations. National economic development moderated new career orientation-educational level relations.

Results support the construct validity of “proactive career orientation” as a unifying construct encompassing protean and psychological mobility boundaryless orientations (cf. Wiernik and Kostal, 2017). Future research should continue to explore career development in diverse economic/cultural contexts.

Small demographic differences suggest that potential benefits of new career orientations are not limited to members of particular groups. Age and education relations were large enough to indicate that large population segments may benefit from additional interventions to support career mobility and development.

This paper uses meta-analytic techniques to investigate demographic differences in career orientations with larger samples than possible in a single primary study. The meta-analytic design permitted investigation of a variety of methodological and cultural/economic moderators not previously considered in career orientation research.

The purpose of this paper is to develop a new conceptualization of the boundaryless career – a widely acknowledged contemporary career concept – that reflects its original description more fully than previous literature has done, and to apply this conceptualization in an empirical investigation of career behavior and intentions of a large sample of European information technology (IT) professionals.

As part of a large study of IT professionals in Europe (N=1,350), the paper had three research objectives. First, the paper developed and empirically tested a new operationalization of a person’s boundaryless career orientation (BCO) that reflects the originally proposed boundaryless career meanings more closely than existing approaches. Second, the paper used this to identify in a holistic manner different patterns of BCO. Third, the paper examined the nature and extent of links between BCO and self-reported career behavior and intentions.

The paper identified five BCO factors that differentiate individuals into three distinct clusters. Although organizational boundaries appeared to be salient for most individuals, they did not differentiate the clusters. Instead, geographical mobility preference and rejection of career opportunities emerged as highly differentiating but hitherto rarely examined types of career boundaries.

The findings can help HR managers to gain a better understanding of different mobility preferences among different groups of employees, which could lead to the development and implementation of more refined reward schemes and career development practices in organizations.

This study provides a new operationalization of the BCO that is grounded in its original definition and offers a new empirically tested 15-item BCO measure. It contributes to career research with scarce empirical findings regarding the components of the BCO, their salience for individuals, and the connections between BCO and behavior.

To provide a further examination into the explanatory factors of employees' mobility for organizations wishing to improve performance by keeping right employees judging from their goal orientation and organizational commitment.

The multivariate statistical methods (MANOVA) together with a longitudinal design are used to test the hypotheses generated from the theory with data gathered from two Taiwan‐based financial institutions.

Suggests that those who quit for what they perceive as upwardly mobile career moves and those who enjoy in‐house promotions both demonstrate a greater degree of positive learning goal orientation than their colleagues who remain stationary in long‐term positions with the same firm. Makes note of the inability of performance goal orientation and organizational commitment to explain employee mobility behaviors.

Generalizability is limited due to the concentration of this longitudinal‐design study on two institutions of a single industry in Taiwan.

Provides a positive advice for organizations to create mechanisms and environment that can engage learning‐oriented employees as meaningful contributors in principal challenges and to use learning experiences to revitalize them and deepen their commitment.

This paper clarifies the influence of goal orientation and organizational commitment upon employees' mobility and identifies their relationship with findings suggesting a direct link between positive learning goal orientation and positive job performance.

Due to the changes in the market, the shift to proactive and self-developed career management is evident. It results in the emergence of contemporary career attitudes, namely, protean and boundaryless ones. Individuals with protean career (PC) and boundaryless career (BC) attitudes may be more inclined to switch jobs, which affect decreased organizational commitment. The purpose of this paper is to analyze whether PC and BC attitudes affect organizational commitment of young adults in finance sector.

The data of 177 young Lithuanian adults from finance sector were collected in quantitative research.

The research results indicate that young adults in finance sector have contemporary career attitudes significantly expressed. The regression analysis findings show that affective commitment is positively predicted by self-directed career management and boundaryless mindset, and negatively predicted by values-driven career orientation and organizational mobility preference. Continuance commitment is negatively predicted by self-directed career management and organizational mobility preference.

This research is valuable as few if any studies cover contemporary career attitudes and organizational commitment of already working young adults in finance sector in a European country, namely, Lithuania.

In a recent investigation undertaken in Western Canada, it was found that school personnel, particularly those at the administrative level, who strongly desired promotion placed a significantly higher emphasis in their role perceptions on Initiating Structure (the organization‐oriented dimension of leader behaviour), and a significantly lower emphasis upon Consideration (the person‐oriented aspect of leader behaviour), than those who possessed low levels of promotional aspiration. Tills impersonal, procedural, and task‐oriented emphasis was evident not only in the administrators' perceptions of the leader behaviour deemed most appropriate for their own present role, but also in their perceptions of the actual leader behaviour exhibited by their immediate superiors. If such highly ambitious individuals gain advancement, it appears likely that the type of administrative climate which they would induce, with such a pronounced emphasis on Initiating Structure allied with a de‐emphasis of Consideration, would lead to future conflict and dysfunctional effects for the educational organization, as teachers become more professional, and newer approaches such as team teaching, collegial organization, and consensual decision‐making—all of which demand rapport and consideration for people—become more widespread.

The purpose of this paper is to offer an ontological and methodological alternative to the functionalist paradigm which currently dominates study of the self-initiated expatriate (SIE). It argues conceptually, and with a practical example, that actor-network theory (ANT) offers an alternative way forward. While the functionalist study of SIE seeks to generate knowledge of value to organizations, ANT seeks to produce practical knowledge from the viewpoint of the SIE(s).

The paper critiques the dominant functionalist approach to the study of SIE through ANT. A case history of a geographically mobile professional is offered to support the use of ANT as an ontological and methodological alternative in this field.

By following the actors through their own stories of mobility the authors argue that it is possible to offer alternative ways of investigating and understanding mobility. In particular, actors enact mobility in unique ways as they move and are, therefore, not easily categorized and in singular classifications, such as the “SIE.”

The study of SIE is an important emerging field of expatriate research. It is currently dominated by the functionalist paradigm. The paper offers an alternative ontological and methodological approach to the study of this field through the use of ANT. In this sense the authors challenge the developing dominant discourse of functionalism currently driving research on this topic.

The purpose of this paper is to establish whether positive or negative relationships exist between boundaryless and protean career attitudes (respectively) and organizational commitment and whether such relationships can be moderated by development opportunities.

Surveys from 212 part‐time MBAs were analyzed using correlation, regression, or moderated multiple regression to explore relationships between boundaryless career attitudes (boundaryless mindset, organizational mobility), protean career attitudes (self‐directed career management, values‐driven career management), organizational commitment (affective, continuance and normative), and development opportunities.

Only organizational mobility preference was correlated (negatively) with each type of commitment. Boundaryless mindset was moderated in its relationship to normative commitment in that lower development opportunities resulted in lower commitment for those with higher levels of boundaryless mindset.

The study is limited due to sample nature and the lack of longitudinal design. Also, it does not provide implications for other types of commitment that may be impacted by career attitudes and development opportunities (occupational commitment, for example).

A counterintuitive finding but important implication from this research is that employers should not assume that protean and boundaryless employees (respectively) will be less committed to the organization. Another practical finding is that developmental opportunities, while important to all employees, did not generally make employees with protean and boundaryless attitudes more committed to their organization.

The paper is the first, to one's knowledge, to assess organizational commitment with specific measures of boundaryless and protean career attitudes. While the results are simple, they refute many stereotypes of the new career and, in that sense, add an important perspective to the career literature.

This paper aims to analyze the differences between assigned expatriates (AEs) and self‐initiated expatriates (SEs) in management and executive positions. The basic research question is how far SEs and AEs differ with respect to their reasons for working internationally and regarding their career aspirations and orientations, and in what way their individual career management differs.

A total of 159 expatriate managers completed an online questionnaire in German. The questionnaire covered psychological constructs and the participating managers' career histories.

It is shown that SEs start their international careers at a younger age, have a higher organizational mobility, and expect higher benefits from international experiences for their future careers. Moreover, career orientation remains relatively stable in SEs over different age groups, whereas it declines for AEs with increasing age.

The study design is cross‐sectional and based on self‐reports, which makes causal explanations of the results difficult and increases the risk of common method bias.

Specific personnel management requirements regarding SEs in contrast to AEs are pointed out especially in the fields of recruitment, retention and career management, which can help support companies in building up a pool of global managers.

The paper adds valuable new insights to the literature on expatriate work and gives further evidence that SEs form a group that has been overlooked for a long time, even though it differs significantly from traditional expatriates who are sent abroad by their employing companies to return some years later.

A work orientation represents a person’s beliefs about the meaning of work – the function work plays in the person’s life and the constellation of values and assumptions the person holds about the work domain. Research has suggested that adults tend to favor one of three primary work orientations: job, career, or calling. Empirical studies have shown that adults with different primary work orientations tend to experience different work and career outcomes; however, scholars have not analyzed how or why an individual first develops a work orientation. In this study, we take a first step toward investigating the origins of adults’ work orientations.

We propose hypotheses drawing on extant literature on the development of work values and occupational inheritance. We test hypotheses using a retrospective research design and survey methodology, with a sample of working adults.

Work orientations are developed through socialization processes with parents during adolescence. There are different patterns of development across the three work orientation categories: stronger calling orientations are developed when both parents possess strong calling orientations; stronger career orientations develop in accordance with fathers’ career orientations; and job orientations are related more to the nature of the adolescent’s relationship with parents than with parents’ own work orientations.

This research provides the first empirical study of the origin and development of work orientations.

This research offers insight into ways generations are connected through the perceived meaning of their work, even as the nature of work changes. We encourage future scholars to use this as a starting point for research on the development of work orientations, and to continue exploring these questions using additional methods, particularly longitudinal study designs.