Kerr Inkson's research while affiliated with University of Auckland and other places
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Publications (85)
In a context of institutionalized regulation and academic framing determined by agency theory, we note paradoxes in board governance literature and practice. These paradoxes concern boards’ conflicting roles of monitoring/control, and innovation/strategy-making. We explore directors’ mind-sets about governance on which their resolution of paradoxes...
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to explore the SIE experiences of women over 50, its drivers, nature and outcomes.
Design/methodology/approach
The paper draws on participant data from in-depth life story interviews with 21 women who had undertaken SIE from New Zealand and later returned. From this sample two subgroups (aid volunteers and co...
This study aims to explore relationships between the motives for international mobility and observed mobility patterns. The key motives of 2,608 skilled expatriate New Zealanders were identified as cultural and travel opportunities, career, economics, affiliations, political environment, and quality-of-life. Mobility patterns, described here as the...
In this chapter we focus on global careers as they apply to Australia (population 22.6 million) and New Zealand (population 4.2 million), developed countries whose culture, language and population has been shaped largely by those of the colonizing British, which they served originally as colonies, and later as dominions. The pressures of anti-colon...
Boundaryless career theories are increasingly prominent in career studies and management studies, and provide a new 'status quo' concerning modern careers. This paper contextualizes the boundaryless careers literature within management studies, and evaluates its contributions, including broadening concepts of career and focusing interorganizational...
The apparent status of having a "celebrity CEO" heading a large organization creates a strong impression that the organization will be successful and forms an almost irresistible force compelling stakeholder commitment. However, a newly appointed celebrity CEO and the celebrity's co-creators run the risk of becoming over-confident, over-optimistic...
In this article we extend consideration of differences of interest in employment relationships to career issues. Two sets of interests — those of employing organizations and of individual workers — often make careers ‘contested terrain’ in which organizations pursue strategic advantages and individuals personal advantages. The contestation is conte...
Eco-careers are careers in which an individual’s values for a sustainable world are a primary consideration in career decisions. Interest in eco-careers is enhanced by the recent growth of green issues and values in society, and by employee involvement in green business initiatives. Recent forces in contemporary careers enhancing interest in eco-ca...
Decades of critical research have established that economic and political ideologies permeate and shape thought, text and action, and academic knowledge production is no exception. This article examines how ideologies might permeate academic texts, by assessing the reach and influence of neoliberalism in research on boundaryless careers. Specifical...
Boundaryless career theories and discourse are increasingly prominent in career studies and management studies, and are considered part of a new "status quo." This paper contextualises career studies and the boundaryless careers literature in terms of its actual and potential contribution to career studies, acknowledging the contributions already m...
Boredom has been largely omitted from the leadership literature, or dismissed as a problem, incongruent with effective leadership. Our research showed that the boredom discourse of senior managers engaged in a leadership development programme contrasted with their construction of challenge in leadership. In a second study, managers considered bored...
Purpose
The paper seeks to determine whether different aspects of migrant pre‐migration characteristics (human capital and motivation to migrate) and post‐migration behaviour (social integration and career self‐management) predict migrants' post‐migration career success.
Design/methodology/approach
The research employed a survey questionnaire appl...
A career has been defined as “the evolving sequence of a person’s work experiences over time”. In this chapter we argue that
the time-based nature of careers, and their longevity, make mobility inevitable, and a key characteristic of careers. Careers
are most commonly metaphorized as “journeys”, which have both physical and psychological elements....
There is bad news: vast gaps of noncommunication currently separate disciplinebased approaches to theory, research and study in careers (Arthur, 2008; Collin & Patton, 2009). There is good news: new initiatives are being taken to begin to unite different disciplinary approaches to careers under the single banner of ‘career studies’ (Gunz & Peiperl,...
The boundaryless career type provides a model of career development that appears to have some advantages over traditional occupational or organizational models. In a changing environment, it encourages mobility, flexibility, the development of knowledge and networks, and the taking of responsibility for one's own career. The boundaryless career als...
Purpose
This paper aims to offer a critique, from a career studies perspective, of the common term “human resource management.”
Design/methodology/approach
Provides a literature review and critique.
Findings
The term “human resource management” is a metaphor that presents employees as passive commodities or assets rather than as active agents, an...
When individuals think about their careers, they often use the metaphor of a journey to make sense of their experiences (Inkson, 2004, 2007). They think of their careers as having movement, as getting them from place to place. Nelson Mandela, for example, described his career as a Long Walk to Freedom:
I have walked that long road to freedom. I hav...
To test hypotheses formulated by Ones and Viswesvaran (1997), a cohort of 47 selected volunteer overseas development workers from New Zealand completed the NEO PI-R ‘Big Five’ personality inventory. In line with hypotheses, these workers were significantly higher than population norms on openness and its six subfacets, and on agreeableness and the...
Purpose
– This paper aims to introduce a collection of papers about careers in cross‐cultural perspective, which contributes to the growing body of literature that addresses careers from different locations around the world.
Design/methodology/approach
– Introduces the topic, providing some background and discussion of the main concepts.
Findings...
“Kerr Inkson has made a really valuable contribution. A powerful illustration of how metaphor influences thinking about careers. The book shows how metaphor helps us to understand our own thought-patterns and predispositions and is very effective in integrating the different branches of career studies Very clear, and well argued. Right on the mark!...
With countries increasingly thinking like organisations as they recruit and retain global talent, it is posited that High Commitment Management (HCM) Human Resource Management (HRM) systems could be applied to help stem the brain drain, particularly in highly mobile/low organisational commitment professions such as Accountancy. In an online survey,...
The terms “protean career” and “boundaryless career” are metaphors. This paper outlines the nature of metaphor and its use in contemporary social science, particularly in the study of careers. It identifies five characteristics of metaphors, which serve as a guide to analyzing and evaluating them. These are (1) literal and figurative meaning; (2) e...
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to provide new information about overseas volunteer development workers undertaking projects in underdeveloped countries, specifically, their backgrounds, personalities, values and previous experience, motivations, experiences, learning and “transformation” gained, and possible impact on further career; the degr...
Recruiting talented workers has become a global international concern, yet the diversity of human motives driving labour mobility has yet to be captured in any psychometric measure. By means of an internet survey administered through 32 professional associations based in New Zealand, 2201 highly skilled but expatriated New Zealanders completed a 26...
The concept of global careers has sparked a significant burst of recent research attention. In this article, we introduce this special issue of the Journal of World Business by raising the question of whether this activity is the result of the emergence of a new phenomenon or simply a new perspective on old issues. We then introduce the articles in...
Talent flow is a process whereby economically valuable individuals migrate between countries, and is arguably a more important global career influence than international flows of personnel within global organizations. In this article, we reject the term brain drain as too restrictive and focus on the psychology of migration, specifically the econom...
In this paper we draw on the high-profile, project-based, self-managed career of New Zealand film-maker Peter Jackson, which reflects an accumulation of knowledge creating an example of a new style of career, transforming the industry environment around him. We consider his career capital through three key 'ways of knowing' that comprise his values...
Career theories and popular beliefs support the view that careers are series of job changes which are normatively linked to common themes, are continuous, are hierarchically progressive, and are under the control of the career-making person. This study reports an age-controlled analysis of the job changes, from 1980 to 1992, of a sample of 832 UK m...
Special edition on “The New Dynamics of Careers” - Volume 11 Issue 2 - Kerr Inkson, Polly Parker
The phenomenon of migration makes many careers international, and globalisation has accelerated the process. This paper reports on a program of studies, now labelled "talent flow," conducted in New Zealand with a view to increasing understanding of migration and its relationship to careers. Initial studies considered the phenomenon of "overseas exp...
Explores worker choices to become self-employed contractors. Adopts a qualitative method and uses data from in-depth interviews with workers from two contrasting occupational groups. Reveals five sets of factors which appear to be central to worker decision making. Contrasts the perspectives of the workers and draws conclusions relating to the impa...
This article examines theorists', practitioners', and workers' extensive use of metaphors in the conceptualization of careers. Metaphor constrains career thinking to powerful stereotypes, yet also extends views through the consideration of alternative metaphors and the creation of new ones. Morgan's (1986) method of multiple metaphor is used to dev...
This paper explores the concept of career communities: social structures that provide career support and frequently transcend the boundaries of any single organization. The theoretical background notes the convergence of a number of different perspectives from both career development and organization studies, pertaining to the social contextualizat...
This paper argues that people's careers have great personal significance for them and energise much organisational activity, but that in the context of organisations and management they often appear irrelevant. Contrasting career metaphors are used to show how careers develop through tensions between organisational and social structure, and individ...
This paper argues that people's careers have great personal significance for them and energise much organisational activity, but that in the context of organisations and management they often appear irrelevant. Contrasting career metaphors are used to show how careers develop through tensions between organisational and social structure, and individ...
Most research in managerial effectiveness, or competence, focuses upon personal attributes of the individual. This understates the impact of context, which can assist or hinder job performance. A national (New Zealand) survey assessed the impact of 16 environmental variables, four management development variables and two variables reflecting person...
“OE” is overseas experience – periods of “working holiday” undertaken by young people autonomously exploring other countries and cultures. This paper investigates OE and considers its effect on career development. OE is a world-wide phenomenon, but has special significance in Australia and New Zealand, where it is undertaken as a “rite of passage”...
his article describes and discusses developments in careers research in the past few years in New Zealand. While detailing some important mainstream research in the 'career development' tradition, it focuses on research conducted largely in New Zealand business schools, which may have been prompted by the country's rapid deregulation in the 1980s a...
This article, first given as an address to the January 2002 National Consultation on Career Development, Ottawa, Ontario, draws attention to the inevitability of metaphor in human thought, discourse, and theory, including that concerning careers. The article (a) explores the benefits and the dangers of metaphorical thinking and advocates the use of...
As organizations restructure to increase flexibility, interim management by contractors is increasing as an alternative to employment of `permanent' managers. Interim managers begin their new role on the basis of transactional psychological contracts with their employer Their careers are based on a logic of accumulation of learning across organizat...
In the turbulence created by such phenomena as business restructuring and new flexible organisational forms, career improvisation grows in relative importance. Two studies are briefly reported. In the first, the common experience of “O.E.” (overseas experience) is shown to provide an example of career improvisation, giving the individual potential...
Expatriate assignment (EA) and overseas experience (OE) models of international career experience are compared. Analysis of recent case study data suggests OE's advantages over EA for people's development and its consequences. In turn, the analysis suggests both human resource management and national policy-making shift from planning toward knowled...
Different models of orientations to work tend to stress the importance to employees of extrinsic outcomes (e.g., money, security) at the expense of intrinsic outcomes (e.g., interest, variety) or vice-versa. Research conducted with manual workers, particularly engineering apprentices, indicates that need fulfilment in both areas is important, with...
Surveyed 89 male engineering apprentices in Auckland, New Zealand, on their future aspirations. Results show that the majority intended to travel overseas following qualification and to move into occupations not directly connected with their trade. Few intended long-term service with their training organizations, and large institutional settings we...
This paper applies a labour process perspective to the "chain system" in the New Zealand meat freezing industry. It traces the introduction of the chain system, contrasting it with traditional work methods and uses this historical perspective to provide a critique of Braverman 's theory of changes in the labour process.
Posits that assembly-line technology can create an alienating environment in which the worker feels powerless, has higher-order needs unfulfilled, and reacts in accordance with a frustration-aggression model. The meat-freezing industry in New Zealand exhibits many potentially alienating characteristics, particularly a paced, segmented workflow. The...
This paper draws together some of the common themes and summarises the key points which emerge from the industry case studies presented in this symposium on technological change.
The Pathways to Sustainable Employment (PAS£) research programme is a five-year programme aimed at determining the supply-side and demand-side parameters of employment-seeking and career development of New Zealanders aged 15-34, and developing policy implications. In an initial phase of the project, 866 participants sampled from four geographical a...
Office temps are contingent workers, predominantly female, with secretarial and administrative skills, who hire their services out through an agency to client organizations requiring temporary labour. As organizations face changes in demand and workload, and seek flexible rather than stable structures, 'temping' is increasing in prevalence and impo...
DISCUSSES ORGANIZATIONAL MEASUREMENT FOLLOWED BY DESCRIPTIVE SUMMARIES OF STRUCTURED INTERVIEWS AMONG EXECUTIVES IN 52 COMPANIES HAVING OVER 250 EMPLOYEES. TESTIMONIES ARE GIVEN ON THE VALUE OF APPLYING SCALING TECHNIQUES FROM INDIVIDUAL PSYCHOLOGY TO THE STUDY OF HUMAN BEHAVIOR AT WORK. (2 P. REF.) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all right...
Explored the tension between the formative (teacher development) and summative (efficient administration) approaches to evaluation of teacher performance in New Zealand, in the context of the managerialist philosophy of education reform. 82 high school principals were surveyed to assess their awareness of and response to this issue and 8 interview-...
Citations
... This Act removed legislative recognition of unions, contributing to a halving in union membership from 45% of the workforce in 1989 to 23% in 1994 (Belich, 2001). By promoting flexibility in employment arrangements and responsiveness to market conditions, and through its use of a new vocabulary replacing traditional terms, the Act highlighted the transactional, impersonal aspects of the employment exchange (Peel & Inkson, 2000). ...
Reference: Leadership and culture in New Zealand
... Kariyer anlayışında meydana gelen değişim, çalışanların kariyere ilişkin bakış açılarında da değişikliğe yol açmıştır. Bireyler, güçlü ekonomik veya kurumsal güçlere istemeden cevap vermek yerine kendi kariyerlerini yönlendirmek üzere daha aktif bir rol üstlenmeye başlamışlardır (Arthur, Inkson & Pringle, 1999). Beraberinde kariyere ve istihdam edilebilirliğe ilişkin örgütün sorumluluğu azalarak bireyin sorumluluğunun arttığı gözlenmiştir (Lips-Wiersma & Hall, 2007). ...
... Isto posto, considera-se que as diversas representações metafóricas podem apresentar certa similaridade em alguns pontos e ou serem complementares entre si, aprofundando o entendimento da natureza geral das carreiras. As carreiras são consecutivamente representadas como metáforas diferentes integradas, e, assim, observam-se as formas em que as carreiras correspondem, ou não correspondem, a cada uma das metáforas (INKSON, , 2010. Com isto, é possível resumir o campo da teoria da carreira em alguns termos-chave arquetípicos de carreira, para os quais Inkson ( , 2004 propõe uma específica tipologia de metáforas, conforme o Quadro 1. ...
... Parasnis, Fausten, and Cheo (2008) find that Australian qualifications do not result in better labour market outcomes for migrants. However, other studies find that host country education is one of the main determinants of immigrant's access to higher paying occupations (Maani, Dai, and Inkson 2015). However, Kaida (2013) shows the host country education benefits only highly educated recent arrivals. ...
... Social marketing and advertising in the age of social media 112 slapstick. On the other hand, ads that have too much humour and use multiple devices are at risk of annoying the audience (Plester & Inkson, 2019). Advertisers also need to be careful that they do not try too many devices at once when creating humorous advertising as, while it can be engaging, the increased cognition also leads to increased discernment and judgement, which can undermine the intended emotional reaction (i.e. ...
... A number of participants use ad hoc contract employment to construct the level of flexibility they require, usually only working when the traveller is at home. While contract or temporary employment may marginalise workers (Hardy and Walker, 2003), it would appear these partners are more "lifestyle temps" who use ad hoc contract work to facilitate balance (Alach and Inkson, 2004). Utilising ad hoc employment to create an employment schedule around a traveller's comings and goings is not a strategy that has been previously identified, but is one that appears to enable the partners to continue with their careers. ...
Reference: The Reviewer from Hell
... The hegemony of this new perspective was underscored for me when, in 2006, I undertook a cursory search for recent educational studies commissioned by the Ministry of Education or the Labour Market Policy Group. I found the following: a description of educational pathways taken by 55,640 students at public tertiary education organisations (Scott, 2004); an empirical study of the formation of educational expectations by young people and their parents (Maloney, 2004); a review and synthesis of international research literature about student decisionmaking (Zepke & Leach, 2005); a five year project looking at the supply-side and demand-side parameters of career development and social capital (Dupuis, Inkson, & McLaren, 2004); an exploratory analysis of young people's perception of career success (Gardiner, c2006); a project investigating the relationship between the NCEA and student motivation to learn (Meyer et al., 2006). Independent longitudinal studies were also being carried out by the New Zealand Council for Educational Research: for instance, Innovative Pathways for Secondary School, which was seeking to unravel the complexity of school-to-work transitions (McDowall & Boyd, 2003), and Learning Curves: Meeting Students' Learning Needs in an Evolving Qualification Regime, which attempted to study how students perceive and make their subject choices within the context of each school's curriculum policies and practices (Hipkins, Vaughan, Beals, & Ferral, 2004). ...
... Many organisations pay director fees to board members (AICD, 2017a), creating an environment where experienced board members may use multiple board roles as their full-time roles. These members may hold multiple board positions that span diverse organisation types, including voluntary roles (Carroll et al., 2017). ...
... Doherty, Dickmann, and Mills (2011) explained that, compared to AEs, career aspirations are complementary to SIEs' personal life paths and their international experience is motivated by the achievement of personal goals with future career prospects less important. Yet, whilst some women SIEs were motivated by personal reasons, they serendipitously also acquired career capital Myers, Inkson, and Pringle (2017). Some research suggested developing a career alongside other personal development considerations was important (Nolan & Morley, 2014;Richardson & McKenna, 2006. ...
... Research on "brain gain" can be divided into three main categories. First, traditionally, it refers to the so-called reverse migration, in which countries that have experienced an exodus of skilled human resources acquire an increasing number of highly skilled human resources by, for example, welcoming returnee immigrants as highly trained and competent (Carr 2006;Inkson et al. 1997). Second, it refers to the education effect, where the average education level of the rest of the population who did not migrate rises because of the increased educational acquisition level of the sending country's citizens who wish to work in the international market (Beine et al. 2011;Dodani and LaPorte 2005;Stark et al. 1997;Stark 2004). ...