A study of career mobility decisions of dual career couples

Abstract

Presently, women in India comprise approximately thirty one present of the total workforce including rural and urban sectors (Budhwar, Saini & Bhatnagar, 2005). This statistics indicates a major social change in the country with an increased professional participation of Indian women. An increase in the number of career women in India has substantially increased the number of Dual Career Couples (DCC) also. DCC was the term first coined by Rapport & Rapport (1969) and is defined as those couples where each of the spouses meets the following criteria: (a) the employment is personally salient to its occupant, (b) it has a developmental sequence over time, and (c) it requires a high degree of commitment from the occupant. The two careers in case of a DCC are considered to be highly demanding. The demands of the careers in the form of time, efforts, adjustments and energy of the couple often pose the challenge of maintaining a balance between their family and professional lives. Due to high degree of commitment towards work as well as towards the family, many of these couples do not want to compromise on any of these aspects. They want to be successful both in their professional as well as personal domains. For the purpose of present study DCCs are defined as “those married couples where both the spouses pursue occupational careers individually. These individual careers require acquiring skills through special training and are characterized by high professional standards, high degree of commitment and developmental sequence As the work environment is changing globally, newer trends of work and career mobility are emerging. The extant literature on career success presents Career Mobility (CM) as one of the most important factors for an individual’s success. Brown (1998) defined CM as organizational, industrial, occupational or geographical mobility of the individuals for enhancing their career prospects. For the purpose of present study CM is defined as “organizational, industrial, occupational or geographical shifts including skill enhancement through training or education, voluntarily made by an individual with the objective of the enhancement of his / her career prospects Although CM is acknowledged as a major factor of success in one’s professional life, yet there is no accepted corpus of theory in this area, no organizing principles, and little coherence and variable quality across the various streams of economics, sociology and management. There is still some literature about CM decisions of an individual, but there seems to be a substantial gap in research about how DCCs take care of these mobility decisions. In case of DCCs, the CM decisions are expected to be more complex in nature due to the intertwining nature of two careers. The present study intended to explore the dynamics of CM decision making in DCCs. Researchers like Eisenhardt (1989) and Guba & Lincoln (1994) advocated the use of research methodology according to the nature of research problem under investigation. Consistent with the research objective, the nature of research questions and the aim of theory building the study followed a qualitative research design with the use of semi-structured interviews and observations for data collection. The unit of analysis was the DCCs, where both spouses have evidenced mobility instances in their career journey. Twenty nine couples at different life cycles stages participated in the study and contributed in helping the researcher to understand the phenomenon of career mobility. Data analysis was eclectic in nature. The CM episodes of each participant were analysed at an ideographic level; then the CM episodes of one spouse were mapped with the CM episodes of the other spouse in a DCC. Each CM decision of the participants was analysed for the decision made; nature of the decision; What was the trigger for it; who initiated and facilitated the career move; what was the dynamics of decision making process within the couple; what was the impact of the career move on the participant’s career and spouse’s career and what were the non-career trade-offs for the spouses associated with the decision. This helped in understanding the dynamics of CM decision making at couple level. Finally, the variations and commonalities in CM decision making were identified across DCCs in each life cycle stage to derive the conclusion. The study highlights the complexity and dynamics associated with CM decisions of DCCs. Based on the work experience of each spouse in a couple, their parental status and age of each of the spouses a life cycle stage typology was developed. This typology consisted of five life cycle stage namely Preparation Stage, Launching Stage, Settling Stage, Establishing Stage and Renewal or Retirement Stage. The key dimensions associated with each career shift of the participants were identified. These dimensions were pre-marriage acquaintance, family responsibilities, financial liabilities, aspiration and energy levels, risk taking attitude and the evolution of life roles for DCCs. As expected the life cycle stage of DCCs played an important role in their CM decisions as their preferences for life roles changed when they moved through one stage to another. DCCs adopted several CM arrangements during their career trajectories. The patterns of CM arrangements for DCCs were identified across the life cycle stages and these patterns were labelled as tied movers, tied stayers, joint seekers, taking turns, scaling back, commuter relationships, hybrid arrangements and multiple arrangements. Based on the nature of their career decisions, DCCs were classified as five couple personalities, namely constricted couples, conventionalist couples, explorers, re-inventors and non-conformists. The study also presents its findings in the form of difference between the career trajectories of women participants and men participants. It was found that even though equally qualified, men and women follow different career paths- with women having more career interruptions than men due to their non-career reasons. The meaning of ‘career’ also found to be changed for both the genders after they reach a certain life cycle stage. The findings of the study provide fuel for future research. The study also highlights the need to broaden the scope of work-family research beyond the existing studies in the Western context.