Questioning is essential for development
What are my strengths and weaknesses? What are my main motivations and values? Is my work aligned with my aspirations? Am I proud or dissatisfied with my current career? These questions often arise in moments of doubt or transition. But a key question arises: is career transition a failure to be endured, or an opportunity to reinvent one’s career path to align one’s work with one’s current passions? Are our aspirations at 30 the same as those we have at 50? In a world where we ask our young adults to choose their path at 21, is this a realistic expectation?
Today, the concept of career anchors, developed by work and organizational psychologist Edgar Schein in the 1980s, offers a framework for exploring these reflections. It helps us to better understand how our career paths evolve according to our talents, motivations and core values.
Career anchors as a professional compass
With experience, everyone becomes more aware of their skills, motivations, needs and life goals. Edgar Schein has identified eight career anchors, which reflect the priorities guiding the building of a career. These anchors enable us to better understand what drives us, and to structure our professional life in harmony with our value system.
The eight career anchors
- Anchor of technical competence: build your career around business expertise, striving for continuous improvement.
- Managerial skills anchor: climb the hierarchical ladder through management positions.
- Anchor of autonomy and independence: value freedom of decision and be prepared to become an auto-entrepreneur to preserve this independence.
- Anchor of security and stability: seeking to establish a stable, predictable career. We all need this, especially when building a family, but this need can also be predominant and guide career development.
- Anchor of creativity: a drive to innovate and create new projects or businesses. Strong motivation to prove to others that you can do it.
- Anchor of dedication to a cause: following a meaningful career, in fields that touch on personal passions or humanitarian missions. Dedication to a specific field in a desire to improve the world is a key motivation.
- Anchor of challenge: constantly seeking challenges, complex problem-solving and success against adversity. People often express the need for great variety in the tasks they perform during their careers.
- Lifestyle anchor: prioritize work-life balance, with adapted schedules and workloads.
A new anchor: international mobility
More recently, a ninth anchor has been added: the international anchor. It represents the choice of a career centered on international mobility and immersion in new cultures, for those who find fulfillment in the discovery of new horizons.
Explore your priorities for an aligned career
Becoming aware of these anchors can help you identify the priorities that have guided your career to date. It also provides an opportunity for reflection, so that you can consider a career change or evolution in line with your current values and aspirations. The key is to see each transition as an opportunity to realign yourself with what you’re passionate about, rather than an obstacle.
Online tests help you discover which anchor is guiding your career path at any given moment. This may change over time, but gives valuable insight into your current priorities.
To remember:
- Our core values and motivations guide our professional choices
- Career Anchors were developed from a longitudinal study to understand employees and their relationships with colleagues.
- Everyone is affected to some extent by the eight (to nine) anchors defined as competence, independence, stability or creativity; one of them certainly resonates more with your aspirations
Source :
Schein, E. H. (1985). Career Anchors: Discovering your real values. https://ci.nii.ac.jp/ncid/BA27484921
