ABSTRACT

The Chaos Theory of Careers outlines the application of chaos theory to the field of career development. It draws together and extends the work that the authors have been doing over the last 8 to 10 years.

This text represents a new perspective on the nature of career development. It emphasizes the dimensions of careers frequently neglected by contemporary accounts of careers such as the challenges and opportunities of uncertainty, the interconnectedness of current life and the potential for information overload, career wisdom as a response to unplanned change, new approaches to vocational assessment based on emergent thinking, the place of spirituality and the search for meaning and purpose in, with and through work, the integration of being and becoming as dimensions of career development.

It will be vital reading for all those working in and studying career development, either at advanced undergraduate or postgraduate level and provides a new and refreshing approach to this fast changing subject.

 

Key themes include:

Factors such as complexity, change, and contribution

People's aspirations in relation to work and personal fulfilment

Contemporary realities of career choice, career development and the working world

 

chapter 1|12 pages

Complexity, Uncertainty and Careers

To live is to change.

chapter 2|11 pages

Complexity, Uncertainty and Career Development Theory

It's not “either/or” it's “both/and.”

chapter 3|11 pages

The Chaos Theory of Careers: Background and Development

Complexity is to blame.

chapter 4|15 pages

The Chaos Theory of Careers: Attractors

Our limits are our freedoms.

chapter 5|17 pages

The Chaos Theory of Careers: Patterns and Fractals

We live between dimensions.

chapter 6|21 pages

The Chaos Theory of Careers: Research Support

Life is empirical.

chapter 8|33 pages

Practical Applications: Counseling and Assessment

Life is helping and being helped.

chapter 10|24 pages

Practical Applications: Organizational Development

Life is organized.

chapter 11|10 pages

Where Are We Going and Where We Have Been

The future is now, not then.