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The Importance of Career Adaptability, Career Resilience, and Employability in Designing a Successful Life

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Psychology of Career Adaptability, Employability and Resilience

Abstract

Advocating a holistic approach, the life design paradigm suggests that individual and environmental constraints as well as resources shape people’s career journeys and their broader evolution. In particular, career adaptability and career resilience are central personal resources that help people in designing their career. In specific situations, people are able to activate these resources, and career interventions can strengthen them. Career adaptability and career resilience also help people to better use their environment’s resources, which eventually contribute to their employability. Over time, these constant interactions between people and their environment can lead to the development of negative spirals or virtuous circles, ultimately fostering adaptive functioning, and a successful life. People’s career path and employability thus depend on a combination of personal, and environmental factors, occurring within specific organizational, social, economic, and political structures.

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Acknowledgements

The contribution of Jérôme Rossier and Grégoire Bollmann benefited from the support of the Swiss National Centre of Competence in Research LIVES—Overcoming vulnerability: Life course perspectives, which is financed by the Swiss National Science Foundation (grant number: 51NF40-160590). The authors are grateful to the Swiss National Science Foundation for its financial assistance.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Psychology, University of Lausanne, Lausanne, Switzerland

    Jérôme Rossier & Grégoire Bollmann

  2. NCCR-LIVEs, University of Lausanne, Lausanne, Switzerland

    Jérôme Rossier & Grégoire Bollmann

  3. Department of Psychology, University of Milano-Bicocca, Milan, Italy

    Maria Cristina Ginevra

  4. Department of Philosophy, Sociology, Education and Applied Psychology, University of Padova, Padua, Italy

    Maria Cristina Ginevra & Laura Nota

  5. Department of Psychology, University of Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland

    Grégoire Bollmann

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  1. Jérôme Rossier
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  2. Maria Cristina Ginevra
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  3. Grégoire Bollmann
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  4. Laura Nota
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Correspondence to Jérôme Rossier .

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  1. Faculty of Education, University of Pretoria, Pretoria, South Africa

    Kobus Maree

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Rossier, J., Ginevra, M.C., Bollmann, G., Nota, L. (2017). The Importance of Career Adaptability, Career Resilience, and Employability in Designing a Successful Life. In: Maree, K. (eds) Psychology of Career Adaptability, Employability and Resilience . Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-66954-0_5

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