Revitalising career counselling to foster career adaptability and resilience during change and turbulence : part 1

Abstract

The 21st century workplace – defined largely by the economic global meltdown in 2008 – is characterised by fundamental change and turbulence at a time when ‘the digital revolution produces jobless work’ (Savickas 2011a, 6). One way to address this situation is to update career counselling theory and practice. Career counselling theorists, practitioners, and researchers need to join hands to meet the career counselling requirements of their clients, including improving their career adaptability, helping them become (more) employable, and strengthening their career resilience. An active, positive approach to career counselling can help workers navigate repeated transitions in the midst of uncertainty, impermanence, despair, and the disappearance of structures that previously upheld a holding environment in the workplace. Hope must be restored in the hearts and minds of current and future employees, and decent work must be made accessible to all work seekers. According to the United Nations (UN 2006, 85): ‘The Decent Work Agenda promotes access for all to freely chosen employment, the recognition of fundamental rights at work, an income to enable people to meet their basic economic, social and family needs and responsibilities and an adequate level of social protection for workers and their family members’ (a definition adopted by the International Labour Organization in 1999). Decent work thus entails productive work for all workers in work environments that promote freedom, equity, security, and human dignity.