Career counseling in a volatile job market: Tiedeman's perspective revisited.

Today's economic cycle is an unpredictable one, and job security has become an elusive experience. Many workers do not expect to have the same job or to work for the same organization long term (Hall & Associates, 1996). For example, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (2004) expects employment growth in the service-providing areas of the economy, such as education and health services, leisure and hospitality, transportation, and computer occupations, in the near future. In contrast, the manufacturing sector has contributed greatly to the mass layoffs experienced in late 2004. There are reports of employment expansion (U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2005), of employers replacing full-time workers with part-time or temporary workers, and of the changing climate of competition in acquiring and retaining employment (Fussell & Furstenberg, 2005). Modern-day employers are also more likely to expect that workers embrace complementary and diverse skills, such as multiskilled positions and cross-training responsibilities (Mangumn, 1996), in an attempt to yield more productivity from new or existing employees.

Phillips (1997) noted that the modern worker is faced with an environment in which major career upheavals occur without warning. Trends in corporate restructuring and downsizing, associated with mergers and profit seeking, have dramatically affected careers that were once thought to be secure for life (L. S. Hansen, 1993; Mangumn, 1996). Like the business world, places of private and public education, government agencies, and health care institutions have been faced with making difficult organizational decisions that require a reduction in the number of employees. Displaced professionals are in need of assistance to find work again. They are also caught in the vulnerable situation of finding it unlikely that they will obtain a similar job, at similar pay, with similar benefits.

Career development theory has infrequently addressed these job market realities, yet Super and Knasel (1981) considered career adaptability to be a major predictor of success. Super (1957) saw adaptability as a maturational phenomenon in which an individual develops coping skills to manage his or her life space, clarify vocational identity issues, and master career-related tasks associated with developmental stages. Career adaptability has also been identified as an important concern in career counseling as the structure of work continues to change (Ebberwein, Krieshok, Ulven, & Prosser, 2004; Swanson & Parcover, 1998). Career counselors often work with clients who are making more job changes as working roles become less stable. Some writers have suggested that the career counseling profession needs to respond more effectively to the plight of the modern worker (Herr, 2000; Holland, 1996). Counselors are faced with the challenge of developing programs and individualized counseling interventions that address the unpredictable changes in the labor landscape. This requires complex assessment skills and interventions that support adaptability. In addition to career decision-making concerns, counselors need to be sensitive to the pain their clients are experiencing. Displaced workers may have identified with their occupations for many years or may feel betrayed after years of commitment. Some clients may be willing to begin anew and pursue an entirely different career direction. Whether this choice is made reluctantly, or whether it is embraced enthusiastically, counselors and clients need to be flexible when considering options and alternatives.

Because the current economy continues to be turbulent, career development specialists need to find creative ways to encourage an atmosphere of career adaptability in their counseling sessions (Pelsma & Arnett, 2002). More than 40 years ago, Tiedeman and O'Hara (1963) suggested that career opportunities are not static entities but are more like flowing oceans; avenues for success are turbulent at times and smooth during others. They believed that adaptation was a natural and essential part of career development.

Tiedeman and O'Hara's (1963) central assumption is that security is dangerous for growth. Challenges are essential for human growth and happiness because without such challenges, clients would not have the opportunity to understand and make sense of themselves in a new context (Miller-Tiedeman & Tiedeman, 1990). From some of his earliest writings, Tiedeman regularly made use of metaphors to describe this more turbulent view of career development. He has compared career development to a journey on a ship: A worker (i.e., the client) is like a captain, and a counselor's role is to help clients navigate through all kinds of conditions in all kinds of weather (Miller-Tiedeman & Tiedeman, 1990). In order to address career development in a holistic way, Tiedeman enhanced traditional congruence approaches, positing that the client is an active participant in the process. This notion of active participation is related to other career development perspectives as well. For example, Tiedeman's (1961) model complements the dynamics of social cognitive career theory whereby low self-efficacy sabotages the clarification/induction decision-making process (Lent & Brown, 1996).

Savickas (Richmond, Savickas, Harris-Bowlsbey, Feller, & Jepsen, 2006) described Tiedeman as the first postmodern career counselor. Jepsen (Richmond et al., 2006) argued that Tiedeman's perspectives were frequently misunderstood and underappreciated. Savickas (Richmond et al., 2006) suggested that Tiedeman made three important conceptual contributions to the field of career development. These contributions include an understanding of the self-conceptualizing process, an exploration of purposeful action in career development, and a description of the career decision-making process.

Perhaps now is an excellent time to consider one of these original contributions by examining Tiedeman's (1961) decision-making model. This model has been historically underused and may be especially valuable as practitioners help their clients address the existing uncertainties in the job market. Tiedeman's model is consistent with the core policies of the National Career Development Association (NCDA; 2007): "development occurs during the lifetime of an individual. It can be described in maturational forms denoting progression through life states and the mastery of developmental tasks at each stage" (p. 6). The model is also consistent with NCDA's policy on helping meet the needs of persons displaced by corporate downsizing (NCDA, 2007).

The Association for Counselor Education and Supervision (ACES) and NCDA have expressed concerns about the ability of counselor education programs to address career development in a more holistic way (S. Hansen, 2000). Pope and Minor (2000) have challenged the field to examine what strategies are being used to excite counseling students about the process of helping people make career transitions in their lives. Perhaps Tiedeman's perspective offers a unique framework for dealing with counseling interventions under volatile, changing labor conditions. Clients need to learn how to be adaptive with their career path, in addition to identifying major career path options. The following review highlights the ways in which Tiedeman's (1961) model accommodates unpredictable career opportunities by using a nontraditional perspective of career development.

Tiedeman's Original Decision-Making Model

Tiedeman's (1961) early decision-making model was influenced by the developmental work of Erikson (1959) and was also constructed in reaction to Super's (1957) developmental perspective. Like Super, Tiedeman conceptualized a model that explored the career process within a developmental framework. Erikson's concepts of psychological differentiation and reintegration were used as Tiedeman considered the variables that affect transitions between developmental stages. In particular, Tiedeman focused on the decision-making process in career development. He placed individual choice and meaning making squarely at the threshold of personal change. In his model, the variables of individual choice and adaptation to changing marketplace conditions influenced the timing and initiation of transitions between developmental phases. Tiedeman described a process of career development in which people continually redefine their career interests and commitments through different decision-making phases. The model supports the notion that individuals who are better at navigating these phases and maintaining flexibility with job market conditions are more likely to experience career success. Unlike the stages in Super's developmental model, Tiedeman's phases may be implemented in nonlinear and multidirectional ways to achieve that success.

The phases in Tiedeman's (1961) decision-making model have been revised and clarified over the years with additional authors (Miller-Tiedeman & Tiedeman, 1990; Tiedeman & O'Hara, 1963). These phases are grouped into anticipatory and implementation activities. Anticipatory activity includes the phases of exploration, crystallization, choice, and specification. Implementation activity includes the phases of induction, reformation, and integration. Each phase is considered a new junction for decision making. The activities within the anticipatory process are reflective of Super's (1957) growth and exploration stages. For example, during the phase of exploration, an individual builds awareness of career options and explores possible avenues for work. During crystallization, decisions are made to focus on a specific career path. The choice phase includes a selection of a career path from among those considered in previous phases. Specification involves an evaluation of, a commitment to, and research specific to that choice. During the induction process, an individual commits to learn as much as he or she can at a new job in the implementation phase. As a person engages in the reformation phase, competency, confidence, and identification are developed in the vocation. In the phase of integration, a person gains perspective on his or her work and authors a more differentiated, collaborative role with peers and supervisors.

In the following sections, major themes embedded in the model are explored. Readers should note that we have constructed our own terms to describe these important developmental dynamics included in the model. Although the terms are not explicitly referred to in Tiedeman's writings, the processes described here are at the heart of what makes this model unique and useful for counselors. We have chosen to focus on these concepts because they have received little attention in the career theory and research literature and may be more compatible with current experiences clients are having in the labor market. Most important, four concepts embedded in Tiedeman's (1961) original model address variables often ignored by other models.

Career Path Recycling 

One of the embedded concepts is that these decision-making phases can be recycled and revisited. If modern workers, positioned by a rapidly changing job market, reconsider and reevaluate career options, the model accommodates this shift in decision making as part of a normal career process. Revisiting prior job options is not interpreted as a career setback, resistance, or failure to make a commitment to a goal. Instead, it is viewed as a normal recycling process. In later revisions of his theory, Super (Super, Savickas, & Super, 1996) supported this idea by suggesting that all of his developmental stages could be repeated on a large scale (with a second career).

In the field of technology, for example, recycling can be a very practical pattern of career development as workers trained to be competent with one level of technology find the same technology to be obsolete in a short period of time. These workers must pursue advanced training in order to maintain a competent level of performance or reconsider their career path. The same phenomenon is also encountered by persons who become more mature and suddenly discover that the initial career path they set out to pursue as a younger person no longer holds the same interest or motivation that it once did. They may be successful at what they are doing but would like to consider exploring different skills associated with a new career direction.

Development in Reverse

In Tiedeman's (1961) model, retro-development is also possible. Working "backward" through decision-making phases can be viewed as a healthy process. As a client reconsiders a career path, prior decision-making phases can be revisited. Consider the situation of a woman with a stable, successful career who is attempting to balance the need to spend time developing her artistic interests and maintain satisfying employment. She may have spent several years satisfied and committed to her current career (integration). However, her need for artistic activity encourages her to evaluate her circumstances within the career (reformation). She reexamines her identity in the career and how she views herself (induction), leading to a period of questioning her investment within the career path (specification). Knowing that her current job and her interest in the arts are equally important, she examines her career choices within the context of balancing her life circumstances, knowing there may be trade-offs. As she continues to reassess many alternatives (crystallization), she is able to make a new career decision that better integrates her strengths. In this example, each phase is experienced in reverse, and yet the progression can be viewed as productive.

In another illustration, a 1st-year lawyer becomes disillusioned with her day-to-day responsibilities within a large firm. Despite her excellent education and training, she has quickly become bored with the common tasks associated with the long hours of work (induction). She wonders why her training did not expose her to some of the tasks involved with the work (specification). She finds herself reconsidering her decision to practice law (choice). This period of doubt leads her to revisit earlier career paths she had considered, including engineering, business administration, and health care roles (crystallization). She soon realizes that most of these career options were paths recommended by well-meaning family members, and now she wants to consider new possibilities (exploration).

Nonlinear Progress

A third major concept embedded in Tiedeman's (1961) model is that a career can be nonlinear. Tiedeman believed that movement was possible between stages that were not contiguous. Indeed, the term stages loses most of its traditional meaning in this context. For example, clients can begin a career path in an implementation phase, shift to an exploration phase, and then shift once again to a reformation phase.

Situations that might illustrate this phenomenon include times when individuals obtain a job because a family member has unexpectedly made a position available. For instance, a recent economics graduate is offered the opportunity to manage his uncle's insurance firm. Because the young man is driven by a need to attain a stable career and substantial salary, he gladly accepts the position. He begins his career bypassing the anticipatory phase and immediately enters the implementation phase. After many years of diligent work and success, he encounters a shift in his priorities. He experiences a desire for self-fulfillment from other avenues of his life. He takes advantage of his acquired success to reflect on earlier aspirations and interests (exploration) and begins to reevaluate his career path in terms of personal satisfaction, not high salary. He once had thoughts of starting his own investment business and uses his previous experience to follow his dreams (Henderson, 2000). He takes the initiative and confidently begins his own business (reformation) with hopes of greater career and life satisfaction despite the risk. In this example, Tiedeman's (1961) model provides a framework to better understand phases associated with evolving priorities throughout life.

Parallel Streams

Another helpful concept embedded in the model accommodates parallel processes in career development. This is seen when people simultaneously pursue different vocational interests. For example, a client might be very invested in exploration activity for a new profession while continuing to develop expertise in a current occupation (reformation). McQuarrie and Jackson (2002) noted that not only are leisure interests an example of this kind of parallel activity, but also that the transitions within leisure and work careers affect each other. For Tiedeman, engagement in parallel vocational paths is not seen as a failure to make a significant investment in a primary occupation but rather as an accepted manner of further exploring one's interests and abilities. A counselor who operates from Tiedeman's perspective would be quite comfortable helping a client simultaneously deal with issues associated with each endeavor.

This is also evident in the experience of cross-training, as roles become merged and more complex. Workers are more likely to be asked to take on different roles that have not traditionally overlapped. If a worker is experiencing stress from taking on new responsibilities, the situation could be reframed as an opportunity rather than a burden. Using the situation to become adept in other tasks is a chance to reintegrate and reinvent a more diverse portfolio of abilities and skills.

Implications

Counselors often need to help clients embrace unexpected job opportunities. Tiedeman's perspective on decision making and vocational development can be an excellent resource for practitioners who are helping clients adapt to a changing marketplace. Career counselors may find these four concepts of recycling, development in reverse, nonlinear progress, and parallel streams helpful to their daily practice and assessment of clients' career development. There is a sense of empowerment and a promotion of flexibility and personal initiative within the model.

Assessment

Using Tiedeman's approach, a primary emphasis is placed on assessing a client's subjectivity. This is considered essential because perceptions and choices contribute so much to the level of intentionality with which one engages in a career trajectory. Specifically, counselors are encouraged to examine the unique aspects of a client's career decision making, how that decision making has affected self-understanding, and how the client tolerates and experiences uncertainty and unexpected working conditions.

Tiedeman's (1961) model can be used to help counselors conceptualize the complexity of a client's career decision-making process. For example, counselors are encouraged to assess parallel streams in career-related interests. Clients might find it helpful to manage streams that are in conflict, once they are identified. During the assessment phase of counseling, efforts can be made to clarify differences between parallel streams and leisure interests.

Difficulties with the decision-making process can be differentiated from common circumstantial problems. Goulet and Singh (2002) suggested that some clients who are having trouble committing to a career path may be having difficulties with issues such as job involvement and fear of losing a job. If there are problems with decisions, these problems can be understood better by noting whether a client is recycling, moving in a nonlinear fashion between the phases, or engaged in a reversal of phases. If problems are circumstantial, the phases provide an indication of where the client may have "left off" with the decision-making process prior to the circumstantial interruption.

Interventions

Tiedeman's (1961) model lends itself easily to the counseling process because of the "decision making" nature of the stages. Using Tiedeman's perspective, a counselor can be comfortable engaging the client in many different phases of career development. A client can move from a maintenance phase to an exploratory phase without the counselor believing that the client is going backward or losing ground. In this way, counselors can empower clients who may not be following a traditional career development path.

Interventions using Tiedeman's concepts can be useful for clients struggling with unforeseen career challenges or for those anticipating possible difficulties in the future. Interventions that create hope, flexibility, resourcefulness, and adaptive cognitive processes are more effective. Such interventions can assist clients to step back, gain new perspectives, and review decisions in conjunction with contextual factors (Pelsma & Arnett, 2002). Learning to deal with adversity and using the opportunity to learn more about oneself and the world of work can greatly benefit a client's outlook. Counselors can adapt the cognitive phases to the individual and explore career past, current career path, and future career expectations.

Last, using the model to normalize transitions and new directions can validate current circumstances and lay a foundation for hope. Tiedeman's (1961) model can assist in normalizing career situations for clients by allowing for change and growth across a life span during which values and priorities may change. According to Miller-Tiedeman and Tiedeman (1990), "if things go well, we have little cause to differentiate" (p. 312), implying that change and challenges facilitate personal growth. When life takes an unexpected turn, adaptability promotes growth from these experiences. Reframing hardships as opportunities is an invaluable tool when dealing with a job market that is unstable or fragile.

Research

The model lends itself well to those engaging in research to track multipotentiality (Sajjadi, Rejskind, & Shore, 2001) and decision-making problems. Tiedeman's (1961) model is one of the few career development theories that provides a conceptual framework for understanding multipotentiality issues in the career development of gifted students, multiskilled individuals, and clients with broad interests. Research designed to track how these parallel interests are managed over time can make use of Tiedeman's phases as descriptive indicators.

The model also provides a developmental window into decision-making processes that are often explored by social cognitive approaches. For example, relationships between Tiedeman's developmental phases and self-efficacy and outcome expectations have rarely been explored. Tiedeman's perspective can help researchers understand how clients with low self-efficacy are shifting from one decision-making phase to the next. Outcome expectations may also be related to specific Tiedeman phase patterns. By using Tiedeman's (1961) model, researchers can explore these variables using analyses that are more sensitive to clients' developmental context.

Tiedeman's perspective, as with most theories, has its limitations. It can be quite challenging and stressful for clients to weather the storms of constant job changes and economic adversities. Caution is advised with clients who have consistent difficulties committing to a career path or to an employer. There may be underlying issues to address within the context of career and life circumstances that are contributing to a pattern of instability. A drastic career path change is not always in the best interest of the client. Although Tiedeman's (1961) model offers a unique and adaptive approach, counselors may wish to use discretion with the application of this model with some clients.

Another limitation of the model is its assumption that choice is central to career development while ignoring other variables such as oppression dynamics. Society creates barriers of many kinds for some clients. Cultural hardships are an important factor to consider because they affect career decisions. However, given that counselors competently attend to multicultural variables in career counseling (Hershenson, 2005), Tiedeman's perspective can be empowering. In this model, a client's evolving dream and vision for his or her future plays a central role as he or she seeks to understand self in a social context.

Conclusion

Although Tiedeman's (1961) model is complex, it is conceptually accessible for the practicing career counselor. Counselors are well aware that career development in the 21st century is rarely uniform and predictable. The idea of nonlinear movement, flexibility, and individual development that Tiedeman's model explores makes it an excellent resource for counselors helping clients contend with a volatile labor market.

It is essential that career counselors have empowering methods available to help clients develop their intentionality and more fully understand their career decision-making process. In addition to dealing with so many factors that influence and inhibit career decisions as highlighted by other career theories, practitioners using Tiedeman's (1961) model can also attend to the choice process directly in ways that other approaches ignore. Tiedeman argued over the years that, in the end, an individual has the potential and the right to become self-authoring in his or her career pursuits. Tiedeman was one of the first postmodern thinkers who saw the career counselor as a professional uniquely qualified to assist in this endeavor.

Unlike other theoretical perspectives, Tiedeman's (1961) model addresses career development patterns that are much more compatible with current occupational trends. Areas of potential employment and job loss adjust and shift with the changing economy and industry demands. Understanding the economic forces influencing employment and unemployment is crucial along with tools to encourage personal resourcefulness and resiliency. Perhaps Tiedeman's approach is the vessel that can help clients successfully navigate these concerns.

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David K. Duys, Department of Counseling, Rehabilitation and Student Development, The University of Iowa; Janice E. Ward, Department of Educational Leadership and Counseling, Southeast Missouri State University; Jane A. Maxwell, Department of Educational Psychology and Special Education, Southern Illinois University; Leslie Eaton-Comerford, School of Public Policy, George Mason University. Leslie Eaton-Comerford is now at Olin Business School, Washington University in St. Louis. Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to David K. Duys, Department of Counseling, Rehabilitation and Student Development, The University of Iowa, N350 Lindquist Center, Iowa City, IA 52242 (e-mail: [e-mail]).