Je ne regrette rien

One of my students, Leesha, last year, conducted a qualitative study into how career changers have made sense of their career paths, and one thing she found was that the participants had no career regrets. They all made choices which didn't turn out so well, but none of them would say that they regretted their choices.

I have been thinking about this, and I wondered what literature there was, out there, which explored this idea of career regrets.

First of all, what do we actually mean by 'regret'?

Regret is a decision making emotion. It’s experienced when you realise that your current situation would now be better had you made a different choice (Landman,1993). It's a backwards looking emotion and signals that you believe you made a poor choice, but it also has links to forward looking emotions in that is has a role in determining future action and directing motivation. The research in this field has been applied to a range of different fields, including organisational behaviour (Maitlis & Ozcelik, 2004) but not really to career choice, despite the fact that career and education choices has been shown to be one of the things that people most regret in life. 

Specific definitions of regret are tricky: ‘The conceptual edges of regret are not sharp’ (Ovid and Gilovich p. 382). In general it is defined as the combination of an emotion and a judgement about a choice you made in the past, which led to your current life being worse that it could have been had you made a different choice. It is not thought to be something that you would do differently if you had your time again, although is often described in this way in the literature. It seems that we don't necessarily think that regrets are a bad thing, with evidence suggesting that we believe that regrets help to motivate us to strive for things we want, help us to better understand ourselves and our past and help to preserve harmonious relationships (Saffrey, Summerville & Roese, 2008).

What kinds of things do we regret?

You can, of course, regret things that you do (regret action) and regret things that you don't do (regret inaction). It seems that it takes us longer to get over an inaction regret than an action regret (so, for example, we recover from taking the wrong job more quickly than we recover from not taking the right job). But action regrets are more intense than inaction regrets. in general, if we can justify the decision we took, the regret is less.

Roese and Summerville (2005) also examined and concluded that opportunity breeds regret. If there is always a chance to go back and do something different, or do a new course, you are more likely to feel regret because you aren’t going to resolve dissonance so completely. Alternatively, if there is clearly no chance that you can fix things, you are more likely to make your peace with your situation more quickly, and the regret dissipates more quickly.  

How do we get over it?

There are two ways that we try to reduce the pain of regret. First there is action. We can put a new plan in to action which changes things. This is more likely to happen after a regrettable action than a regrettable inaction. Second, we can do something called psycholgical repair, which describes the process of chainging the way we think about the issue, and so reducing the regret we feel. We do this in two ways. We identify a silver lining (the job was clearly the wrong choice, but at least I got some experience of project management) or we do something called dissonance reduction, in which we convince ourselves that our current situation is better than we thought (I didn't really want that job anyway). This is explained by the theory of regret (Zeelenberg & Pieters, 2007).

But what about career regrets specifically?

There isn't very much written about career regrets as such even though it's clear that career regrets play heavily on a lot of people's minds.

Roese and Summerville (2005) in a meta-analysis of 11 regret ranking studies show that people regret (in order) educational, career, romance, parenting, self and leisure choices. Education accounts for 32% of all the reported regrets, career 22%. Morrison and Roese (2011) also found that career was one of the most common regrets (although this time ranking just below romance).

Career regrets associated with behaviour aimed at increasing objective success (promotion and pay) and with subjective success (choosing a values-driven career, or re-training). Sullivan and colleagues (2007) found that people who had been made redundant regretted not having played politics, and not having made more family-oriented career choices.

Santra and Giri (2017) found that IT professionals in India all had career regrets.They regretted things they did, things they didn't do, their career choices and their levels of career success, but inexplicably, their career regrets were positively correlated with job satisfaction: the more regrets they had, the happier they were at work.

I think there is more work to be done here. Why did Leesha's participants not regret their choices? They said that it was because even though they had made bad decisions, the decisions they made had led them to their current, positive position. So that might indicate that regret is linked with current levels of satisfaction. But that's not the findings from Santra and Giri's study. Those authors suggested that their surprising result might be explained by their cultural position, so perhaps another survey with UK participants could be valuable?

I'd be interested to explore the links between career regrets and current levels of satisfaction, and to see whether people regretted lack of subjective or objective success, and maybe whether or not there are explanations in the number of career changes people have had: their opportunities for course correction.

  

References

Morrison, M., & Roese, N. J. (2011). Regrets of the typical American: Findings from a nationally representative sample. Social Psychological and Personality Science, 2(6), 576-583.

Roese, N. J., & Summerville, A. (2005). What we regret most... and why. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 31(9), 1273-1285. 

Saffrey, C., Summerville, A., & Roese, N. J. (2008). Praise for regret: People value regret above other negative emotions. Motivation and emotion, 32(1), 46-54.

Santra, S., & Giri, V. N. (2017). IMPACT OF CAREER REGRET ON CAREER OUTCOMES OF INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY (IT) PROFESSIONALS IN INDIA. ASBBS Proceedings, 24(1), 481. 

Sullivan, S. E., Forret, M. L., & Mainiero, L. A. (2007). No regrets? An investigation of the relationship between being laid off and experiencing career regrets. Journal of Managerial Psychology, 22(8), 787-804.

Goerke, Moller, & Schulz-Hardt, 2004; Maitlis & Ozcelik, 2004

What factors do people actually base their career decisions on?

I've been doing a bit of digging around to find out what empirical evidence there is about the factors on which people base their career choices. 

There is quite a bit published on this topic, which I've sumarised below, but it's notable that pretty much every study gets its data by asking people what factors influenced their choices. This I think is problematic because it assumes a rational model of career decision making, in which people are fully aware of the basis of their choice. Decision making research, however, suggests otherwise, demonstrating time and again that people are not aware of the reasons for their choices.This indicates that we need to be very clear that the career research only tells us about the factors that people believe influenced their choices, rather than the information which actually did.

A further, although I think much less significant problem with the existing literature, is that much of the literature uses students studying vocational courses as participants - finding out why engineering students decided to choose engineering. You can see that the choice to study engineering might be linked to the choice to pursue engineering as a career, but the two are not the same.

That said, it is still quite interesting to understand that the factors that people think they base their decisions on, and the research gives a fairly broad account of this.

Rousseau and Venter (2009) summarise the research in a framework which highlights that there are three types of factors that are reported. First there are individual factors, which generally focus on career related interests, personality and skills. Second are environmental factors which are quite pragmatic and include the number of job opportunitites there are, the requirements of the job and the chances of professional development or promotion. The final group of factors are described as situational and these include things such as the educational level of the individual, and the influence of their family and friends.

There is empirical evidence that these factors are all perceived to have an influence on job choice, but they are not all equally prevalent in the literature. Abrahams et al. (2015) review the literature and found that the most prominent were family, academic potential, job opportunities, and socio cultural factors. In another review,
de Magalhaes and Wilde, 2015 concluded that money, job availability, job security and opportunities for advancement were the most important factors.

Paolillo and Estes (1982) asked engineers, accountants, doctors and lawyers to rate how important the following factors were to their job choice:

Earning potential
Association with people in that profesion
Parental influence
Cost of education
Social status attainment
Job satisfaction
Years of education required
Aptitude for subject
Teacher influence
Peer influence
Previous work experience
Availability of employment

Astonishly, they found that the two LEAST influential factors were job satisfaction and aptidude. This suggests that their participants felt that they were far more influenced by advice from others (parents, teachers and peers), the opportunities which came their way (previous experience and contacts) pragmatic factors (cost and time of training and availability) and extrinsic rewards (social status and earning potential).

Other more recent students support these relative weightings. Advice from others was shown by Chope, 2005; Dick and Rallis, 1991; Ferry, 2006; Jawirtz, & Case, 1998; Myburgh, 2005; potential for development  was shown by Abrahams et al., 2015 and Rousseau & Venter, 2009; and extrinsic rewards by Abrahams et al., 2015; Jawirtz, & Case, 1998 and Lanthan, Ostrowski & Pavlock, 1987. A few other factors have shown up occasionally. Instrinsic aspects of the job were shown by Mashige and Oduntan, 2011 and Palmer, Burket & Aubusson,2017, who identified values as important, skills were rated as important in a number of studies (Jawirtz, & Case, 1998; Rousseau and Venter, 2009) and Stephen and Makotose, 2007, found that their engineer participants were intrinsically motivated by their interest in the topic. Finally, Jawirtz & Case found that participants were influenced by their perceptions of the social identities of the occupation they were considering. 

Overall then, the literature suggests that people don't think their job choices are very influenced by their belief that they will enjoy or be good at the job. Instead, they are far more influenced by their belief in their ability to get the job, the views of their family and friends and their perceptions of their chances of objective career success (money and promotions).

References
Abrahams, F., Jano, R., & van Lill, B. (2015). Factors influencing the career choice of undergraduate students at a historically disadvantaged South African university. Industry and Higher Education, 29(3), 209-219.

Chope, R. C. (2005). Qualitatively assessing family influence in career decision making. Journal of Career Assessment, 13(4), 395-414.

Dick, T. P., & Rallis, S. F. (1991). Factors and influences on high school students' career choices. Journal for Research in Mathematics Education, 281-292.

de Magalhaes, J. R. A., & Wilde, H. (2015). An exploratory study of the career drivers of accounting students. Journal of Business & Economics Research (Online), 13(4), 155. 

Geiger, M. A., & Ogilby, S. M. (2000). The first course in accounting: students’ perceptions and their effect on the decision to major in accounting. Journal of Accounting Education, 18(2), 63-78.

Hackman, J. R., & Oldham, G. R. (1976). Motivation through the design of work: Test of a theory. Organizational behavior and human performance, 16(2), 250-279.

Humphrey, S. E., Nahrgang, J. D., & Morgeson, F. P. (2007). Integrating motivational, social, and contextual work design features: a meta-analytic summary and theoretical extension of the work design literature. The Journal of Applied Psychology, 92(5), 1332 - 1356.

Jawirtz, J., & Case, J. (1998). Exploring the reasons South African students give for studying engineering. International Journal of Engineering Education, 14(4), 235-240. 

Mashige, K. P., & Oduntan, O. A. (2011). Factors influencing South African optometry students in choosing their career and institution of learning. African Vision and Eye Health, 70(1), 21-28.

Paolillo, J. G., & Estes, R. W. (1982). An Empirical Analysis of Career Choice Factors Among Accountants, Attorneys, Engineers, and Physicians. THE ACCOUNTING REVIEW, 57(4).

Palmer, T. A., Burke, P. F., & Aubusson, P. (2017). Why school students choose and reject science: a study of the factors that students consider when selecting subjects. International Journal of Science Education, 39(6), 645-662.

Rousseau, G. G., & Venter, D. J. (2009). Investigating the importance of factors related to career choice. Management Dynamics: Journal of the Southern African Institute for Management Scientists, 18(3), 2-14.

Now what's cooler than being cool?

One construct which I'm thinking a bit about at the moment is the idea of being 'cool' and what impact, if any, this has on career thinking and career choices. To me it seems that being cool (whatever exactly this may mean) seems to have an impact on so many of the decisions of young people, I can't believe that it has no impact on career decisions. But I haven't come across much literature which explores this. 

The term cool originated in black culture in the 1920s in the US. It was a word used to define the resistance to conformity which jazz musicians enacted through drugs, alcohol and language (Shapiro, 1999). It meant pro-drug, anti-caring and anti-authority, and represented detachment, hedonism and narcissism (Pountain and Robins, 2000).

It has been adopted by youth culture and now refers to things which are up to date and desirable (Keller & Kalmus, 2009). It's a widely used term and is almost always positive, particularly for teenagers, and it seems that Generation Y set particular store by coolness (Goodman & Dretzin, 2001). Cool can be symbolised by actions, goods and attitudes, although which things symbolise cool will differ from one group to another and from one time to another.

Runyan, Moh and Mosier (2012) explored the concept of cool and worked out that it was made up of two dimensions: hedonic (does it please?) and utilitarian (is it useful?). Hedonic cool is broken down into singular cool (something unusual which highlights independence and individuality), reference cool (something which is clearly linked to a desirable reference group), personal cool (something which really well represents your own self-concept), aesthetic cool (something which is well-designed and attractive). Utilitarian cool is broken into functional cool (does it work?) and quality cool (is it well made?).

So how does this all fit with jobs? Neff, Wissinger and Zukin (2005) wrote an interesting paper which looked at hot industries and cool jobs and described the glamorous pull towards fashion modelling as a career with its beautiful people, high salaries and rock 'n' roll lifestyles. Elstad (2015)  suggests that artistic jobs are cool because they are unique and don't conform to standard rules or logic. This fits with the early definitions of 'cool' as anti-authority, They also suggest that cool jobs have high levels of job satisfaction, through high levels of intrinsic motivation and autonomy. These link to Runyan et al.'s (2012) ideas of singular cool (independence and individuality) and personal cool (something which represents your own self-concept) and I guess aesthetic cool because it's art.

It seems then that there are some jobs which are cool and some which aren't and that this is possibly linked to Runyan et al's five kinds of cool. 

There is also some evidence out there that 'a cool image' does seem to be important to young people making career choices (Young 2003) and Torraco (2004) showed that levels of cool influence the career-related choices that women make - specifically, that girls don't join chess clubs (which can develop the skills which help you to get into STEM careers) because they aren't cool.

So, the literature tells us what cool means; we know that coolness is of enormous importance to young people; and there is a little bit of a empirical evidence that the coolness of an occupation's image has an impact on career choice. But I think this is an area which needs more research!



References


Elstad, B. (2015). Freelancing: Cool jobs or bad jobs?. Nordisk kulturpolitisk tidsskrift, 18(01), 101-124.
Goodman, B., & Dretzin, R. (2001). Frontline: merchants of cool. Public Broadcasting Service, 27.
Keller, M., & Kalmus, V. (2009). What makes me cool? Estonian tweens' interpretative repertoires. Young Consumers, 10(4), 329-341.
Neff, G., Wissinger, E., & Zukin, S. (2005). Entrepreneurial labor among cultural producers:“Cool” jobs in “hot” industries. Social semiotics, 15(3), 307-334.
Pountain, D., & Robins, D. (2001). L'esprit cool: éthique, esthétique, phénomène culturel. Éd. Autrement.
Runyan, R. C., Noh, M., & Mosier, J. (2013). What is cool? Operationalizing the Construct in an Apparel Context. Journal of Fashion Marketing and Management: An International Journal, 17(3), 322-340.
Torraco, L. A. (2004). Chess Club Is Not Cool: An Essay on the Choices Women Make that Preclude Them from Higher Professional Levels. Cardozo Women's LJ, 11, 589.
Shapiro, H. (1999) Waiting for the man
Young, J. (2003). The extent to which information communication technology careers fulfil the career ideals of girls. Australasian Journal of Information Systems, 10(2).

Rapport: what is it and how can we build more of it?

The idea of rapport intrigues me. We know it’s an important part of building relationships, and we know that the quality of the relationship is something which has quite an impact (possibly the biggest single impact) on the outcomes of coaching and counselling. We can recognise it when we see it, and can feel when it’s not there. But defining it in detail, and, from my particular interest area, trying to teach it, is much more tricky. One of the reasons that it’s hard to put your finger on is because of its ‘gestalt’ nature – because it is made up of so many different elements, verbal and non-verbal. 

So I’ve done some digging around and this is what I’ve found. 

First, it’s useful to reflect that rapport is something which only exists in relationships. It’s not something that you can have on your own, it’s not a personality trait, although some people may be better than others at developing it in some situations. It emerges through the interaction between two people – when two people ‘click’ and it’s hard to work out where it starts and what comes from me and what comes from you.

Tickle-Degnen and Rosenthal (1990) identified three key elements which need to be in place for rapport to emerge. First, they talk about mutual attentiveness. This is when both parties are focused on each other, and the interaction is cohesive. Second, there needs to be some positivity. This happens when both parties feel friendly and caring towards each other. The third element is coordination. I had more trouble understanding what this one means, but it seems to be when the two of you feel in synch, balanced and harmonious. My feeling here is that coordination might be difficult to control, but that we can all think about how attentive we are to the person we are trying to develop rapport with, and that we can all make sure that we communicate the fact that we are pleased to be in a conversation with them.

The paper also examines the non-verbal behaviour which is linked with these rapport building aspects. They found that the following behaviours were more likely to be exhibited when there was good rapport: leaning forward, smiling, nodding, uncrossed arms, direct gaze and posture mirroring. 

The research described here shows correlations not causation: these kinds of behaviours are more likely to be exhibited when there is rapport, but we can’t be sure that more of these behaviours would lead to better rapport. But I think that cultivating an awareness of these attributes could be a useful framework for encouraging us to think about the rapport which we can feel in our new relationships.  

Tickle-Degnen, L., & Rosenthal, R. (1990). The nature of rapport and its nonverbal correlates. Psychological inquiry, 1(4), 285-293.