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This paper aims to link findings from laboratory-based decision-making research and decision-making competence (DMC) aspects that may be central for career-related decision-making processes. Past research has identified individual differences in rational responses in decision situations, which the authors refer to as DMC. Although there is a robust literature on departures from rational responses focused on heuristics and biases (H&B) in decision-making, such evidence is largely confined to group-level differences observed in psychology laboratories and has not been extended to the realm of career development and workforce behavior.

By first introducing the concept of DMC and contextualizing it within organizations and the work environment, the paper outlines a review on recent development concerning debiasing interventions in organizations and provides insights on how these may be effective with regard to organizational performance and individual career development.

The contribution presents a perspective to improve knowledge about career decision-making competence (C-DMC) by presenting an approach linking decision-making research to interventions aiming at managing H&B and systematic misperceptions in career processes.

This contribution is one of the few linking decision-making research to the applied context of organizations and of career competences. Moreover, while some research has treated decision-making skills as traits, this contribution provides support to consider them developable as competencies.

The objective of the study was to explore the factors influencing the career decisions of students doing the students' undergraduate (UG) and postgraduate (PG) programmes from urban private universities/colleges in the Indian context.

Career decision-making is determined by different factors and is contextual. The present study explores and identifies the prominent factors influencing career decision-making. A pool of 33 questions was developed, and these questions were initially administered to a sample of 233 students. Principal component analysis with Varimax Rotation identified salient factors. In the second study, confirmatory analysis was performed based on the opinion of 304 students.

The study shows that the student's career deciding factors include (1) career clarity, (2) career exploration, (3) career reward and recognition and (4) career initiative for professional and personal growth.

The study focussed on career-deciding factors for UG and PG students from urban universities/colleges in the Indian context and the findings can be used for planning career counselling interventions.

The career is a space where family and work lives amalgamate. The role of work for the individual, and the meaning of work within the culture, will determine the relevance of family. This study investigates CEOs' perception about conjugal family influence on career decisions, and it examines family factors.

Through a qualitative study, 22 Latin American CEOs who work for multinational firms were interviewed in a semi-structured way.

Not all career decisions were influenced by conjugal family. CEOs varied in the extent to which they considered their families when reflecting on their career decisions. Expatriation, joining or quitting an organization and change of area of work were found as those decisions perceived to be influenced by conjugal family. Family support, family structure and family demands and responsibilities were identified as the family factors involved. In spite of the role salience, family factors influenced some of CEOs' career decisions, in part, due to the cultural characteristics of the Latin American environment. The instrumental support of the extended family, as part of collectivist societies, was also evidenced.

A better understanding of the family influenced decisions and family factors involved may enhance individual career decision-making as well as organizational career management processes and public initiatives.

This study contributes to family and career literature, being the first one to explore the conjugal family influence upon CEOs' career decisions.

This study adopts an action research approach with the aim of improving the process of career decision making among undergraduates in a business school at a “new” university in the UK.

The study utilised unfreezing techniques, multiple case studies in conjunction with the principle of analogical encoding, and lecture input to influence the values underpinning the way students intend to engage in the process of career decision making. The paper draws on evidence collected over three cycles of an action research project and from different data sources, i.e. questionnaires, interviews and observations.

The study found that students from working class and middle class backgrounds exhibited similar types of career decision making behaviour. The students tended not to have a future orientation; they relied on informally absorbed information and their intuition rather than rational approaches to decision making; and they demonstrated an unwillingness to be instrumental and operate as “players”. The series of interventions (i.e. the unfreezing exercise, the case studies and the lecture input) resulted in shifts in attitude to career decision making and preparation, particularly for those students who engaged in all three stages of the intervention The unfreezing exercise was seen as particularly important in encouraging students to critically reflect on their career decision making.

This research provides new insights into the factors influencing the way undergraduates approach career decision making. It also provides suggestions for encouraging students to critically reflect on how they make career decisions and prepare for the transition to the graduate labour market.

Examines the issues which managers consider when making career decisions and finds that, faced with reduced levels of employment security, they are redefining careers in terms that now include references to lifestyle and the achievement of a balance between the personal, domestic and employment aspects of their lives. Identifies that changes in any of these areas of managers’ lives can cause them to revise their career strategies. Identifies that life events also have a major impact upon career decisions. Recognises that there are gender‐related differences in the career strategies that managers adopt. Concludes that for some managers the definition of self is becoming less focused upon employment and more related to lifestyle.

The effect of vicarious learning during clinical or medical internships on graduates' adaptive career behaviours has attracted scant attention from healthcare researchers, particularly, in the developing world context. Drawing upon the social cognitive career theory model of career self-management (SCCT-CSM), the current study examines how vicarious learning influences the clinical graduates' adaptive career behaviours (i.e. career exploration and decision-making) via career exploration and decision-making self-efficacy (CEDSE) and career intention.

Data were collected from 293 nursing graduates undertaking clinical internships in 25 hospitals across Nigeria who willingly participated in this study as they were also assured of confidentiality at two-waves. The proposed hypotheses were tested using a path analysis.

The findings showed that vicarious learning during clinical internship had a direct effect on career exploration, decision-making and career decision self-efficacy among graduate trainees. Also, the findings revealed that the effects of vicarious learning on the graduates' career exploration and career decision-making were significantly mediated by career decision self-efficacy and career intentions.

The findings of this study have important practical implications for higher education institutions and industries that send and receive clinical graduates for clinical internships to gain more skills. More emphasis should be on encouraging learners to learn vicariously in addition to other forms of learning experiences available during clinical internships.

The study explains that the graduates' higher engagement in clinical career exploration and decision-making was based on a higher level of vicarious learning during internships. The results suggest that higher education institutions and healthcare service providers can derive greater benefits from more emphasis on promoting vicarious learning during clinical internships.

Lesbian, gay and bisexual (LGB) employees constitute one of the largest, but least studied, minority groups in the workforce. This article examines what we know, and what we need to know, about the career and workplace experiences of this understudied population. The construct of sexual identity is defined, followed by a review of the research on sexual orientation in the workplace. Then an analysis of the differences between LGB employees and other stigmatized groups is presented. Three unique challenges facing LGB employees are identified, and conceptual models are developed that explain underlying processes. Finally, career theories are critically analyzed, and an identity-based longitudinal theory of LGB careers is presented.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the nature and significance of flexibility in decisions about education and training options. This is done through an examination of the relevance of real options valuation (ROV) to our understanding of educational and training choices. Through this examination, the paper aims to contribute to the debate about how we can better advise and support people making such decisions.

The research involved three overlapping stages: a critical examination of the theoretical work on flexibility in decisions; a review of the literature on the role and significance of flexibility in education and training decisions; and an application of the lessons of ROV to the analysis of decisions about education, training and careers.

The analysis of the theoretical work on flexibility alongside the review of the literature on education and training decision‐making, demonstrated that there was little current application of theory to the analysis of such choices. Reviewing the literature, it was discovered that ROV held significant lessons for the analysis of education and training decisions, and important practical implications for the support and guidance of people making these choices.

This is the first study to apply the principles of ROV to educational and training choices.

The purpose of this study is to examine the role of mastery goal orientation, support for career development, career decision-making self-efficacy and engineering interest in career adaptability for engineering students.

Data were collected from 307 Korean engineering students from two universities. Structural equation modeling was used to analyze data and examine the relationships among the variables.

The results indicated that the level of mastery of goal orientation and support for career development significantly affected career decision-making self-efficacy. Engineering students’ career decision-making self-efficacy also positively influenced their engineering interests and career adaptability. Finally, the students’ engineering interest positively affected their career adaptability.

This study demonstrated that important factors for career planning and development need to be successively considered during the career choice process by linking it to career decision-making self-efficacy, engineering interest and career adaptability (career choice action), in consecutive order.

This paper aims to examine the extent to which economic factors influence the career decision‐making process of working class students.

The study involved an initial survey of 165 final‐year students from a range of degree programmes. It was followed by in‐depth interviews with 30 working class students.

It is shown that many working class students are not actively involved in career enhancing activities that develop their employability. The majority of students are also failing to engage seriously in the career decision‐making process. Furthermore, most students indicate that they wish to remain within commuting distance of their home when looking for jobs. Existing research identifies limited economic capital as an important factor influencing such behaviour. However, this study suggests that the students' values and their non‐financial circumstances appear to have more effect on their career decision making.

If economic factors were the most important influence on the career decision‐making behaviour of working class students there would be a limited role for careers education. However, because the students' values appear to be a more important influence there is scope for intervention. This paper suggests that activity based approaches using multiple case studies, analogical encoding and group work seem to provide the best way of encouraging students to critically evaluate the way they currently engage in career decision making.

This paper provides evidence to support interventions to improve the career decision‐making behaviour of working class students (and the wider student population). It also advocates a novel approach to such interventions.