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Employees facing challenges in their careers – i.e. female, migrant, elderly and lower-educated employees – might expect job searches to have a low likelihood of success and might therefore more often stay in unsatisfactory positions. The goal of this study is to discover inequalities in job mobility for these employees.

We rely on a large sample of Dutch public sector employees (N = 30,709) and study whether employees with challenges in their careers are hampered in translating job dissatisfaction into job searches. Additionally, we assess whether this is due to their perceptions of labor market alternatives.

Findings show that non-Western migrant, elderly and lower-educated employees are less likely to act on job dissatisfaction than their advantaged counterparts, whereas women are more likely than men to do so. Additionally, we find that although they perceive labor market opportunities as limited, this does not affect their propensity to search for different jobs.

This paper is novel in discovering inequalities in job mobility by analyzing whether employees facing challenges in their careers are less likely to act on job dissatisfaction and therefore more likely to remain in unsatisfactory positions.

This study aims to explore the relationships between career competencies and job search self-efficacy via the serial multiple mediation effect of career adaptability and self-perceived employability within multiple theoretical frameworks.

This study adopts a cross-sectional design to collect data at a specific point in time and employs self-report questionnaires to collect data from participants. In total, 302 students from the “management and organization department” in a vocational school of a public university completed the survey forms. To test the hypothesized model, a serial multiple mediation analysis was performed using structural equation modeling (SEM) via SPSS (Statistical Package for Social Sciences) AMOS (Analysis of Moment Structures).

The results indicated that career competencies, career adaptability, job search self-efficacy and self-perceived employability all had significant and positive relationships. Additionally, the relationship between career competencies and job search self-efficacy was serially mediated by career adaptability and self-perceived employability as anticipated.

Considering the growing importance of the subject of how universities might better prepare their graduates for the job market, the study's findings have important policy implications. University students should also be provided with career management resources, specifically adaptation resources, to help them navigate their individual characteristics and transfer more successfully into the existing job market. This is the cause of the need for constant planning, adaptation, assessment and evaluation of career competencies in current labor markets.

The study contributes to international career development and vocational education research by filling a gap in the literature by demonstrating that job search self-efficacy, which is a predictor of job search behavior, can be promoted by career competencies, career adaptability and self-perceived employability. These findings are particularly significant because they highlight the importance of career-related knowledge, skills and abilities in engaging university students seeking employment in a developing country with a highly competitive labor market.

The purpose of this study is to explore the perspectives of Generation Z college students regarding the job selection process, as well as the impact of digital technology on their career choices and job search endeavors.

Using the grounded theory methodology, the study used in-depth interviews with 15 participants to investigate the research inquiries.

The study identified six emerging themes related to the career aspirations of Generation Z students. The authors generated a job selection process model of Generation Z based on participants’ accounts of their recent job search experience. The model portrays the decision-making process performed by Generation Z job seekers while determining their career path.

To enhance comprehension of the job selection process among Generation Z individuals, future studies should incorporate a broader range of participants encompassing diverse cultural, social and economic backgrounds. Scholars have the potential to examine the relationships between Generation Z job seekers’ job selection, job performance and job satisfaction through a quantitative approach.

The six themes pertaining to optimal jobs for Generation Z can assist HR professionals in enhancing their understanding of the emerging pool of young and talented individuals. The utilization of the four-stage job selection process model may serve as a valuable tool for college career service professionals in the enhancement of tailored training programs.

This empirical study examines Generation Z job seekers’ attitudes toward their future profession, their perceptions of ideal occupations and the influence of technology on their search, preparation and selection processes for future careers.

The outbreak of COVID-19 has caused a slowdown of economic activity across the globe, which has resulted in high levels of disruption to labour markets. This study seeks to examine how the outbreak of COVID-19 has impacted the search strategies of students seeking for an internship, and whether these have changed since the start of the pandemic. The study utilises the strength of weak ties hypothesis, social capital theory and status attainment theory to explore the changes in securing a position since the outbreak of COVID-19.

This study draws on data from two cohorts of MBA students seeking to secure internships: one before the outbreak and one during. A multinomial regression is employed to examine how students have used network ties to secure internships and how this has changed since the outbreak of COVID-19.

The multinomial regression results indicate that there was little difference in the strategies employed by students before the crisis compared to those that secured them during, potentially indicating that students are unwilling to deviate from typical job search strategies, especially in times of uncertainty.

This study provides insights into how network ties are used by job seekers during a period of economic and environmental uncertainty.

This paper aims to investigate the association of COVID-19 confirmed cases and deaths with mental health, unemployment and financial markets-related search terms for the USA, the UK, India and worldwide using Google Trends.

The authors use Spearman’s rank correlation coefficients to assess the relationship between relative search volumes (RSVs) and mental health, unemployment and financial markets-related search terms, with the total confirmed COVID-19 cases as well as deaths in the USA, UK, India and worldwide. The sample period starts from the day 100 cases were reported for the first time, which is 7 March 2020, 13 March 2020, 23 March 2020 and 28 January 2020 for the US, the UK, India and worldwide, respectively, and ends on 25 June 2020.

The results indicate a significant increase in anxiety, depression and stress leading to sleeping disorders or insomnia, further deteriorating mental health. The RSVs of employment are negatively significant, implying that people are hesitant to search for new jobs due to being susceptible to exposure, imposed lockdown and social distancing measures and changing employment patterns. The RSVs for financial terms exhibit the varying associations of COVID-19 cases and deaths with the stock market, loans, rent, etc.

This study has implications for the policymakers, health experts and the government. The state governments must provide proper medical facilities and holistic care to the affected population. It may be noted that the findings of this study only lead us to conclude about the relationship between COVID-19 cases and deaths and Google Trends searches, and do not as such indicate the effect on actual behaviour.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first attempt to investigate the relationship between the number of COVID-19 cases and deaths in the USA, UK and India and at the global level and RSVs for mental health-related, job-related and financial keywords.

Although research on job insecurity (JI) and its relationship with employee performance has increased in recent years, results are mixed and inconclusive. The objectives of this paper are to explore 1) the conceptualizations of JI, 2) the relationship between JI and different performance dimensions, 3) the theoretical perspectives used to explain the JI–performance relationship and 4) the mechanisms and contextual boundaries that affect the JI–performance relationship.

Following the PRISMA guidelines, the authors systematically searched for peer-reviewed empirical studies published before July 2021 in Web of Science and Scopus. The authors analyzed 81 empirical studies published on the conceptualization of job insecurity, its relationship with employee performance, and what mechanisms and contingency factors are studied. The authors used thematic analysis to analyze the articles.

Results of this review show that the quantitative cognitive dimension is dominant in extant JI literature. Furthermore, in-role performance and OCB were most often investigated in relation to the four dimensions of job insecurity, drawing from a range of theoretical perspectives to explain this relationship. Moreover, a variety of mechanisms and contextual factors on individual, individual work-related, individual-level attitudes and job-level characteristics have found to play a role in this relationship.

This study has a number of limitations. The first pertains to the exclusion of articles in languages other than English and non-peer reviewed papers. It is possible that the search strategy used may not have identified other studies that may have met the established criteria in order to be included in our research. However, this method was chosen to guarantee the quality of the included articles in this study and in line with previous meta-analyses and literature reviews (De Witte et al., 2016; Sverke et al., 2019). Second, one selection criteria focused on how performance was assessed in the studies incorporated in this literature review. The authors excluded studies that addressed performance from the perspective of the organization (i.e. studies that measured performance at the organizational level). The authors herewith might have excluded studies that focused on one or multiple job insecurity constructs, but the authors herewith included studies that were comparable in terms of performance indicator outcomes. Future studies could expand the search by investigating, as a next step, the impact on organizational performance. Finally, since the focus of this literature review was on the relationship between job insecurity and performance indicators, including the mechanisms and boundary conditions that affect this relationship, the authors did not include focus on how job insecurity can be influenced (Shoss, 2017), and herewith lack information on the predictors side of job insecurity. However, by narrowing the authors focus to mediators and moderators, the authors were able to come up with an extensive list of factors that impact the job insecurity–performance relationship and herewith provide fruitful areas for future research. Future studies could expand these findings by providing an overview of predictors of different job insecurity constructs, to see whether there are potential different predictors of job insecurity conceptualizations (Jiang and Lavaysse, 2018).

The study review contributes to the systematization of the current empirical evidence on this area of research. This is especially important and enables room to take an additional step toward understanding the consequences of job insecurity on performance. Specifically, it is important for organizations and policymakers to be aware of the different conceptualizations of job insecurity that exist and how they impact employee performance. In addition, an overview of potential mechanisms and boundary conditions that affect this relationship provides insights as to how organizations can intervene to affect reactions to job insecurity.

The study findings are relevant and may be of interest to decision makers in organizations and national authorities that must have information on quality concerning the effects of job insecurity on performance.

Based on these findings the authors show the impact of the different conceptualizations of job insecurity and how they affect job performance. In addition, the authors provide recommendations for future studies how to better handle the integration of different conceptualizations and measures of job insecurity and its different approaches.

Within the umbrella of technology and vocational education (TVET), technology or technical education in higher institutions of learning is obligated to produce the required manpower needed in the industry. Thus, it is pertinent to explore the interaction between the industry and higher education students. Drawing on the tenets of theory of planned behavior (TPB), this study offers valuable insights into the nomological networks of work-integrated learning (WIL), perceived behavioral control (PBC), subjective norm (SBN), personal attitude (PAT) and job search intention (JSI).

The study applied a structurally hypothesized model that was drawn from the TPB to collect data for the constructs. Using a cross-sectional survey after the WIL experiences of the students, we collected data from technology education undergraduates (N = 214) in their final academic year from universities in Nigeria.

With structural equation modeling, the study found that WIL is directly associated with JSI, PBC, SBN and PAT. In line with the tenets of the TPB, simple mediation models were supported about the influence of WIL on JSI via PBC and PAT discretely but not via SBN. Further, the results support two paths of serial mediation models, indicating sequential indirect links between WIL and JSI via SBN and PBC, as well as via SBN and PAT.

Our findings have implications for higher education practitioners, industry experts and employers of labor.

Although extant literature has relatively shown that WIL impacts employability skills, this study has remarkably shown the WIL-JSI nexuses within the variables of TPB.

Despite the dramatic increase in people's use of social media, relatively few studies have examined its effect on careers. Drawing upon social comparison theory and self-regulation theory, this study aims to investigate how career-oriented social media usage interacts with social comparison orientation (SCO) to influence the career exploration of university students.

Three waves of survey data are collected from 482 university students in China. Hypotheses are tested through ordinary least squares analysis.

Results show that career-oriented social media usage increases career anxiety, which in turn promotes career exploration. Furthermore, SCO strengthens such influence of career-oriented social media usage.

Given the limited attention paid to the effects of social media in career contexts, this study distinguishes career-oriented social media usage and proposes insights into its effect on career exploration. In doing so, this study extends social media literature and provides implications for the transition of university students from school to work in the digital era.

Individual Placement and Support (IPS) is an evidence-based employment model, effective in supporting individuals with severe mental health difficulties to gain competitive employment. Irish mental health policy recognises its value and IPS is being rolled out in a national programme. Employment is recognised an important contributor to mental health recovery and social inclusion. However, research on IPS has tended to focus on competitive job outcomes. The purpose of this study was to explore the non-vocational outcomes of IPS in an Irish context.

A qualitative research approach was used to interview participants taking part in IPS within community mental health teams. Twelve interviews were included in the data analysis process which was informed by a thematic analysis approach.

Participants experienced increased confidence and positivity, both within a work context and whilst job seeking. More purposeful time use, participation in activities and engagement with society were also experienced by those employed and those at the job search stage of IPS.

This study contributes to the literature about the non-vocational benefits of IPS within an Irish context, highlights the mental health recovery benefits of taking part in IPS and supports the need for ongoing development of IPS throughout mental health services in Ireland.

The paper aims at assessing the role of the different stages of the employment process in gauging workers' willingness to upskill themselves at the end of a seasonal employment contract by investing in further training.

The paper analyses data from a dedicated survey administered to a sample of seasonal employees. Through a regression analysis it explores the different stages of the employment process (job search, selection on the job activities), making a distinction between monetary and nonmonetary components of the investment in training.

Results show that all stages matter, but they do not have the same importance. Ex-ante motivations and work experience, notably the level of perceived workload and organizational commitment, are the main factors affecting workers' willingness to acquire industry-specific skills through training.

So far, the literature has extensively dealt with the poor levels of training in seasonal employers, but it did not analyse worker’s willingness to invest in training over the different stages of the worker experience. This paper fills this gap by separately testing the relative importance of such stages and identifying the most important phases of the employment process.