Where & What Type of WorkWhere & What Type of WorkDifferent Strokes for Different FolksWhat do you want out of your career? Do you look for security and stability, or does being exposed to constant challenges drive you? Do you want to manage people and resources, or does technology keep you excited? Edgar Schein, widely acclaimed as one of the founders of the field of organisational psychology, suggests that every one of us has a particular orientation towards work and that we all approach our work with a certain set of priority and values. He calls this concept our ‘career anchors’.
Career anchors include talents, motives, values and attitudes which give stability and direction to a person’s career – it is the ‘motivator’ or ‘driver’ of that person. A career anchor is the one element in your self-concept that you will not give up, even in the face of difficult choices. Schein claims that we have five primary anchors:
Because career roles can allow for more than one anchor to be satisfied – for example, a manager in a secure and stable environment, it is quite possible for a person not to identify their one overriding anchor. However, when the anchor is missing from the mix – for example, a technically/functionally anchored person gains promotion to a management role and has lost the opportunity to satisfy their core anchor, people can still perform competently but will probably feel the real them is not being engaged and will feel less satisfied and less happy. Identifying your core anchor and pursuing roles which allow this anchor to be satisfied will reward you with an enjoyable and successful career. This article was written by the Careers Advisory Service at Victoria University of Wellington in New Zealand. While it was originally developed for a New Zealand audience, we believe that graduates in Australia will also find the information within it relevant and useful. Check out the excellent resources available on the Victoria University of Wellington's Careers Homepage |