Moving from job loss to career management: The past, present, and future of involuntary job loss research
Section snippets
Introduction to job loss and job loss research
Job loss continues to be a pervasive issue for millions of workers around the globe. In the “new normal” economy, many individuals can expect to lose a job through a downsizing, company closure, or restructuring, and expect to be unemployed for a longer period of time (Censky, 2011). Research has documented the negative impact of the experience and the factors that lead to impairments in well-being. Research also has identified coping strategies and other variables that position individuals
Understanding the meaning of work
Any conversation about unemployment is inherently a conversation about the absence of work and the meaning of work. In fact, much of the early research of job loss in the 20th century focused on understanding what the absence of work meant for individuals who involuntarily lost their jobs (e.g., Fryer and Payne, 1986, Jahoda, 1981, Warr, 1987).
Fryer and Payne (1986) provide more detail for the reader interested in learning about the early job loss research. In general, early work viewed
Conceptual, integrative models of stress, appraisal, and coping with job loss
In the 1980s and 1990s, the rates of job loss increased significantly with larger numbers of educated workers experiencing job loss than had been the case in earlier large scale downsizings and company closures (Farber, 1997). During this era, the psychological contract between workers and employers became a thing of the past (Rousseau, 1989).
Research during this time frequently drew from Lazarus and Folkman's (1984) stress, appraisal, and coping framework (e.g., Hamilton et al., 1993, Kinicki
Making meaning of job loss research results
Research testing the models discussed and related research provides validating and new information about variables that impact the job loss experience, including the moderators and mediators of relationships (e.g., Kinicki et al., 2000, Leana and Feldman, 1990, Wanberg et al., 2012). Some studies have involved randomized field experiments (Caplan et al., 1989, Vinokur et al., 2000), examined the effects of interventions designed to offset the negative impact of job loss (e.g., Audhoe et al.,
Future research
Drawing from the collective and growing body of knowledge about job loss, the next sections offer directions for future theoretical and empirical research in general as well as for research related to outplacement and other organizations, and research to inform policy decisions.
Conclusion
Decades of research of job loss have provided some answers but also raised many questions about the impact of the event on individuals. The earliest recorded research focused on identifying the impact on the individual of being involuntarily unemployed. The development and testing of models and other theoretical frameworks designed to make sense of the existing research followed. A major focus of this research was on understanding how individuals appraise and cope with the stress of losing a
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2022, Human Resource Management ReviewCitation Excerpt :Second, this paper examines voluntary, inter-role CTs. There have already been several in-depth examinations of involuntary CTs, such as those triggered by lay offs (Gowan, 2014; van Dierendonck & Jacobs, 2012) or career shocks (Akkermans et al., 2018; Blokker, Akkermans, Tims, Jansen, & Khapova, 2019). In contrast, this paper focuses on decision-making regarding objective, inter-role CTs rather than subjective, intra-role CTs.
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2018, Journal of Vocational BehaviorCitation Excerpt :Moreover, job loss can cascade into other losses: financial (McKee-Ryan et al., 2005), relationships (DeFrank & Ivancevich, 1986), identity/self-esteem (Fryer & Payne, 1986), and even one's sense of meaning and purpose (Jahoda, 1982). Negative career impacts can include re-employment in poorer quality, lower paying jobs (Gowan, 2014), increased vulnerability to future job loss (Eliason & Storrie, 2009), and exiting the workforce prematurely (Gabriel, Gray & Goregaokar, 2010). Indeed, the challenges of job loss do not simply fade away with reemployment and underemployment can sometimes be just as devastating as unemployment to one's well-being (McKee-Ryan & Harvey, 2011).
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2016, Human Resource Management ReviewCitation Excerpt :When we write about ‘self-definitions’, we use it as a shorthand to refer both to (broad) self-concepts and (specific) identities. In addition, we focus on involuntary job loss, i.e., people losing their job without wanting to lose it and through no fault of their own (Gowan, 2014). We use the concept ‘unemployed’ to refer to job-loss victims during the period after job loss when they are searching for a new job (Ezzy, 1993).
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