Chapter 5: A Review Of Models Of Career Interventions: Implications for Career Development

Dramatic changes across cultures in the nature of work, workplace, employer-employee relationships, and career patterns have resulted in more complicated career interventions (Kummerow, 2000; Rifkin, 1995). Since Frank Parsons’ time, nearly a century of social change has brought forth exciting new models of career development theory and intervention, including new directions for career counseling (Hansen, 2000). We know that career interventions generally have positive effects (Baker & Popowicz, 1983; Spokane & Oliver, 1983). Summaries of the aggregate effects on career knowledge, attitudes, or behaviors demonstrate that career education (Baker & Popowicz, 1983; Hoyt, 1980), career counseling (Holland, Magoon, & Spokane, 1981; Spokane & Oliver, 1983; Oliver & Spokane, 1988), and career guidance (Herr & Cramer, 1996) yield positive results. The literature clearly demonstrates that the utility of such interventions are no longer in doubt (Rounds & Tinsley, 1984). Now we need to determine which interventions work best with which populations and under what circumstances. Consequently, researchers are studying how interventions achieve their effects and how to optimize these effects (Savickas, 1989a). Relatively little research has addressed the outcomes of career counseling processes based on different procedures and conceptual perspectives (McBride, 2001).