ABSTRACT
That experiences and meanings of careers may differ significantly from one person to another, and in time and place, is embodied in the life trajectories of the authors of the present chapter – a father and son in academia. The senior author, upon completing his PhD in the late 1970s, immediately received job offers from several universities and had the luxury of choosing one that suited his needs at the time. He has pursued a conventional academic career with a secure and rewarding retirement, as well as the usual regret about missing opportunities and taking wrong paths. But the opportunities and paths were there all along. Such fortune seemed to be the case for many in his professional cohort. Indeed, partaking in decades of research in organizational behavior, he has observed how scholars in management and organizational studies upheld a simple causal view of careers. Just recently, at the Academy of Management’s annual meeting, he sat through several sessions of the flourishing Careers Division dealing with “career success” as a socially promulgated “career outcome” and well-researched construct (e.g., Arthur et al., 2005; Heslin, 2005; Seibert et al., 2001). Surprisingly, only marginal discussion occurred over what really constitutes “success” in career, at what costs is success achieved, and why people still choose to pursue such unclear and at times dubious outcomes. The term “career failure” was scantly raised.
