Careers of professional staff in Australian and UK universities: A mixed methods pilot study

Abstract

This article confirms the reliability of a protean and boundaryless career attitudes scale, tested in a pilot study. Additionally, it summarises the results of this study into the career attitudes of professional staff in Australian and UK universities. A mixed methods approach was taken using a survey consisting of both closed questions on a 5-point Likert type scale, and an open text question that asked for respondents’ career stories. The convenience sample consisted of 19 staff from Australia and 12 from the UK. The findings suggest that professional staff create a hybrid approach to managing their career, showing aspects of protean, boundaryless and traditional career attitudes and that there are no significant differences between the career attitudes of these staff in Australia and the UK. There is a clear need for further research to test these results, which could be used to inform universities’ human resource strategies