Women opting in?: New perspectives on the Kaleidoscope Career Model

Abstract

This paper reports on findings of an interpretive study, which used the Kaleidoscope Career Model as lens through which to view the careers of professional women in education. The study used hermeneutic phenomenology, a methodology novel in management and career management to gain a subjective perspective on women’s career experience and what career means to them at different career stages. Findings indicated that women did not “opt-out,” or adopt a clear-cut gender beta career pattern. Rather, they mirrored an alpha pattern with challenge continuing into mid-career. The three Kaleidoscope Career Model parameters operated in an ongoing way in women’s lives, and authenticity was a powerful theme throughout their careers. However, women in late career tended to “lean back”; their desire for authenticity became subjugated by their need for balance. These findings add to extant Kaleidoscope Career Model research and reveal factors, which contribute to women’s ability to “opt-in” rather than out of their careers.

Keywords

Careers women Kaleidoscope Career Model phenomenology hermeneutic phenomenology

Introduction

A decade ago, the “opt-out” revolution became the focus of media attention, as many highly educated women were leaving the workforce mid-career, choosing not to continue to advance their careers. As a response Mainiero and Sullivan (2005) developed their Kaleidoscope Career Model (KCM) that sought to explain reasons for this phenomenon. The model provides a means to explore career patterns and is based on the premise that career decisions are guided by three parameters—authenticity, balance, and challenge. Although the three parameters coexist, typically they are distinct and nonoverlapping with one parameter taking precedence at a time in an individual’s career. Considerable research was carried out and distinctive gendered patterns emerged: women tended to demonstrate careers trademarked by interruptions and to adopt a beta career pattern of challenge followed by balance then authenticity, whereas men traditionally exhibited an alpha career pattern of challenge followed by authenticity then balance (CAB).

This paper builds on previous research on the KCM by using it as a lens through which to view the career experience of women across the life span. It reports on findings of hermeneutic phenomenological research to examine women’s career experience and what career means to them at different career stages. This paper specifically talks back to KCM research and the KCM three-stage model for careers across the life span (Mainiero & Sullivan, 2005). It considers how changes in the role of gender influence on the career decisions of women to “opt-in” rather than out of the workforce.

Women’s careers

Women’s career research has focused on the inhibiting nature of relationships, with women being constrained by multiple responsibilities of caring. Women’s careers have typically been characterized by interdependence and fluidity between a myriad of roles (Gallos, 1989; O’Neil, Hopkins, & Bilimoria, 2013; Pringle & McCulloch Dixon, 2003). Further, career analysis from a radical feminist perspective has focused on difference theory, in particular, theories of women’s psychological development. Although this has resulted in alternative notions of career, such models risk implicitly generating an essentialist gender view (Arthur, Inkson, & Pringle, 1999; Cabrera, 2007; O’Neil & Bilimoria, 2005). In some countries ideology that values different abilities and roles produces strongly gendered career options with the view that women and men are “equal but different” (Hutchings, Lirio, & Metcalfe, 2012). However, in some western countries there are perceptible shifts occurring with demographic trends revealing dual income households have principally superseded the traditional male breadwinner model across all groupings (Santos & Cabral-Cardoso, 2008).

Dual careers and crossover effects

Dual career couples (DCC) is an established construct in the career literature, for DCC can potentially achieve flexible work arrangements between the partners (Rusconi, Moen, & Kaduk, 2013). Dual careers have become established as a new norm among professional couples (Santos & Cabral-Cardoso, 2008) and are no longer an atypical pattern (Rapoport & Rapoport, 1969). DCCs are seen to address the challenges of managing not just individual but shared career–life goals. The characteristics of interdependence and fluidity typically described as distinctive for women’s careers have become a pattern for careers in general (Clarke, 2015; Woodd, 2000).

A partner’s support for a woman’s career has received attention in the career literature alongside an ongoing debate as to whether men and women are “allies or adversaries” in balancing the demands of managing work and family. Major and Burke (2013) described men who “get it” and who become allies rather than impediments. In a similar vein, Litano, Myers, and Major (2014) suggested that the answer to the debate relies on the extent to which women and men’s efforts to juggle work–family conflict are synchronous.

Positive crossover effects in the work–family boundary have been found where men and women have been shown to be allies as they try to balance work and family as a couple (Bakker, Westman, & van Emmerik, 2009; Kinnunen, Rantanen, & Mauno, 2013). Crossover research examines the transfer of positive or negative states of well-being from one partner to the other in a DCC. Positive well-being was identified as passing from one person to another in both work and family domains “initiating an upward spiral of positive transfer” (Litano et al., 2014, p. 372).

Research has also found crossover effects among couples due to a spouse’s gender role orientation, which is defined as the strength with which a person adheres to the traditional gender roles in his/her society. Gender role orientation includes roles such as the husband as breadwinner and the head of the family, and the wife as submissive caregiver for children and household (Livingston & Judge, 2008). When one partner assumes a traditional gender role orientation, it intensifies the other partner’s work–family conflict, irrespective of whether the spouse is male or female (Kailasapathy, Kraimer, & Metz, 2014). Alternatively, when a woman’s partner in a DCC adheres to a more egalitarian gender role the partner readily shares the caregiving and household tasks (Kailasapathy et al., 2014). Possessing nontraditional gender beliefs means that partners attach the same value to both their careers and their roles as coproviders (Rusconi et al., 2013). In some cases both women and men are now choosing to “lean back” rather than “lean in” and strive for increased flexibility at work rather than long hours and high pay (Major & Burke, 2013). It was women’s choice to “lean” or “opt-out” which was the initial focus of Mainiero and Sullivan’s KCM career model (2005).

KCM

In the KCM three career parameters are used to explain how individuals make career decisions, defined as follows (Mainiero & Sullivan, 2005, pp. 113–114):

Authenticity: Can I be myself in the midst of all of this and still be authentic?

Balance: If I make this career decision, can I balance the parts of my life well so there can be a coherent whole?

Challenge: Will I be sufficiently challenged if I accept this career option?

The KCM uses the metaphor of a kaleidoscope for careers. Rotating a kaleidoscope tube produces changing patterns as its glass chips fall into complex patterns. At different times, an individual will change their career pattern and choose to work toward balance at one time and toward challenge or authenticity at another to achieve the best fit among demands and constraints of work, relationships, and values. Just as a kaleidoscope, by ongoing adjustments, generates a distinctive pattern, an individual creates an individually crafted career pattern.

Empirical research aimed at validating the KCM (Cabrera, 2007; Sullivan & Mainiero, 2007) revealed gender differences in career enactment. Men tended to follow what the researchers labeled an alpha Kaleidoscope Career pattern of CAB. In comparison, women are described as having a beta Kaleidoscope Career pattern of challenge followed by balance then authenticity. Further U.S. research confirmed these patterns and revealed that typically men follow more linear careers whereas women reject traditional linear career progression. Women experience career interruptions due to the contextual nature of their decision-making and their relationship responsibilities (Cabrera, 2009). Sullivan, Forret, Carraher, and Mainiero (2009) examined differences between the needs of two generations according to the KCM parameters and found Generation X had a greater need for authenticity and balance than Baby boomers. Qualitative studies conducted with women in late career found the three KCM parameters all had pertinence for older working women, with distinct meanings linked to authenticity and to a lesser degree with balance (August, 2011; Elley-Brown, 2011).

Over the past three years, several qualitative studies that incorporated the KCM have produced findings at variance with previous research. Findings reveal clear gendered career patterns giving way to new, less distinct patterns, related not necessarily to gender but to other factors. A longitudinal study by Cohen (2014) with women who had left organizations and moved to self-employment involved interviews 17 years apart. Findings revealed that at first, challenge dominated for these women in early career supported by a desire for authenticity, which developed and “provided a coherent thread through the two interviews” (p. 113); it was established and incorporated both challenge and balance. Second, results were at variance with those of Mainiero and Sullivan (2005) at mid-career where a shift to balance is not a strong feature of the data. Third, rather than “distinct and uncontested parameters” (p. 119) there were no sharp divisions, rather there was a fusing of the parameters at various points in women’s lives (Cohen, 2014).

A study by Clarke (2015), which used the KCM in interviews with 18 DCCs in Australia, found gendered KCM patterns are being subsumed by different patterns less related to gender and more to other factors within their dual career such as motivation and career aspirations. These Gen Y couples’ career choices were shown to be less constrained by gender stereotypes, superseded by a desire to have a mixture of both balance and challenge.

A further qualitative study on the careers of female CEOs in New Zealand sport management (Shaw & Leberman, 2015) suggested extensions to the KCM. These researchers argued for a more “nuanced approach” (p. 505) to capture the career experiences of women working in sport’s gendered environment. Findings indicated subthemes. Specifically, the authors suggested subheadings of passion and relationship building under authenticity, self-awareness and influencing the organization under balance, and taking opportunities and working in sport’s gendered environment under challenge. These extensions are useful and will ensure continued progression of the KCM model only if they are validated by further findings such as those provided by this study.

A recent critique of selected career constructs identified a “dark side” to contemporary career experiences. Baruch and Vardi (2016) cautioned that although the KCM is rooted in positive career outcomes, contemporary career experiences can often contain disillusionment. Some individuals may find appeal in being confronted with ongoing career transitions and challenges. However, these may by their nature intensify the individual’s anxiety and diminish their confidence. When employees in organizations undergo chronic experiences involving enforced career change, this may result in disengagement and burnout. They argued (Baruch & Vardi, 2016) that for a majority of people, the need for authenticity must be suppressed as they remain focused on making a living a contention which findings from the present study support.

To explore the impact of these factors, the research reported in this paper examines how professional women working in education are seeking to make meaning of their careers. It questions whether the gendered career patterns established by the KCM continue to be followed as women negotiate multiple demands of a professional career and family within an education occupational context.

The research study

The research question guiding this aspect of the study was to ascertain if using a phenomenological approach might contribute to Mainiero and Sullivan’s (2005) KCM. The research design incorporated elements to satisfy ethics approval (AUT Ethics 12/96) for the study, which included protection of participant privacy through procedures to ensure confidentiality and anonymity such as pseudonyms and the removal of any personal identifying details of participants’ careers.

Purposive sampling technique (Bryman & Bell, 2015) was used which meant that participants were selected guided by the research questions posed and to fulfill the primary criteria: to have experienced a career in the education sector and be willing to talk about their experience and what career means for them.The potential sample was invited to participate by responding to the advertisement in a popular women’s magazine. Additional participants were recruited using a snowball technique through contacts of the researcher and supervisors. Historically, education has been a significant sector for female employment in New Zealand (NZHRC, 2012), and in other comparable Western countries (United Nations Statistics Division, 2012).

The study sample consisted of 14 professional women, aged between 30 and 60 years, and all working in the education industry at primary, secondary, or tertiary level. All participants lived in New Zealand, and all had tertiary qualifications ranging from a diploma to a doctorate. All women had a partner. One woman had no children, six women had one child, five had two children, and two women had three children.

Hermeneutic phenomenology was chosen as the most appropriate methodology to gain a subjective view of women’s careers. Phenomenology seeks to answer meaning questions with focus on individuals’ experience of a phenomenon from the “inside” (van Manen, 1990). The methodological approach requires that each participant be reflective and be able to articulate her thoughts in an interview setting with women involved in education likely to be adept communicators.

An in-depth conversational (van Manen, 1990) or philosophical hermeneutic interview (Vandermause & Fleming, 2011) is required to enable the participant and researcher to engage in a fluid conversation and to remain as close as possible to the lived experience of the participant and more particularly, what it means to them (van Manen, 1990). A small number of questions prompted the conversation, e.g. “Do you think that your work has helped you find out who you are?” “Can you tell me how you have been able to manage to balance the needs of family life and relationships amidst the demands of your working life?” (refer Appendix 1). The researcher worked with the participant to interpret each question and used repetition, prompts, silence, and reflection. The researcher’s role is to discover what it means for a participant to “be,” as the phenomenon revealed through the stories a participant tells (van Manen, 1990). A key feature of the interview is that data analysis begins while the interview is in progress, in an interpretive procedure where the researcher begins to question the participant’s responses and to work with the participant to interpret and make meaning of them (Vandermause & Fleming, 2011). The interview is active, simultaneously making meaning during the process.

Each interview of approximately 1 hour took place in a participant’s home or workplace. All interviews were audio-recorded and transcribed verbatim. The analytic approach used was consistent with van Manen’s (1990) phenomenological approach where the first stage was to read and analyze the transcripts individually for relevant incidents and stories (Vandermause & Fleming, 2011).

Phenomenological anecdotes were then composed and reduced using a process described as “phenomenological reduction” (van Manen, 1990) so that they contained meanings and interpretive content rather than solely descriptive narrative information. This piecemeal process involved cut and pasting from the transcripts, deleting superfluous words in the search for meaning, and sense making using a participant’s own words. Seldom was a story told all at once, more often it was threaded through a transcript. The process of capturing participants’ stories in phenomenological anecdotes is time consuming and there is no use of coding tools, as with other qualitative analysis. Rather the researcher is the interpretive “tool” by which aspects of the participant experience are exposed (van Manen, 1990).

Once the anecdotes were written from each participant’s data, they were returned to the participants for review. A crucial part of the analytic process is that participants are involved in “radical criticism” of the data (Crotty, 1998, p. 87). All participants gave approval for the data analysis process to continue, and once this was gained, broad themes that uncovered meanings of the experience were identified (van Manen, 1990). The aim of phenomenological research is to create a composite description of the phenomenon of interest for all participants that was in this case: a woman’s career.

Findings and discussion

This section links and synthesizes findings and discusses them in relation to KCM research. Consistent with the “ABC Model of Kaleidoscope Careers for Women” (Mainiero & Sullivan, 2005, p. 115) the findings are introduced in three sections—early, mid, and late career—with excerpts from the phenomenological anecdotes woven throughout.

Early career women

Jackie and Libby had worked in education for less than 10 years and were early in their careers. Jackie (aged 34) is a secondary school teacher with management responsibility. She describes how a “road of Damascus” event in Mali, one of the world’s least-developed countries, led her into teaching:

I knew then, I wanted to do ground breaking work for low socio-economic kids who are so bright yet no one has picked apart what makes them learn. That’s the impetus. I want to write materials for these kids so that they can succeed, so I can die saying, “I know I’ve done something good.” That’s my soapbox and what drives me.

Libby (aged 34) had recently returned from maternity leave to take up a management position in a primary school. Although she knew that the new role would be challenging, she was reluctant to let it go past given that she had already invested strongly in her career development:

The same role came up and I grabbed it. The last year has been very challenging, returning to work, with a young child, wanting to carry my career on at exactly the same rate. It’s very busy but I’m happy: I’ve found my niche. I like seeing myself amongst the decision makers. I want to further develop my leadership skills, to begin postgraduate study.

Mainiero and Sullivan (2006) described how in early career, “men and women equally pursue the thrill of the hunt” in their desire for achievement. Libby and Jackie both evidence a passion for their career with the concept of challenge also being apparent in their accounts. They want to continue to build on their skills and to seek career advancement. Both women sought challenge as they managed full-time work with family responsibilities and were also seeking to pursue further study: Jackie had recently completed a Master’s degree.

While these women in early career sought the “thrill” of career advancement, they were also determined to be authentic and true to themselves (Hall & Mao, 2015). Jackie had worked briefly in marketing before she trained in teaching; she spoke of being called to “make a difference.” Similar to participants in Cohen’s (2014) study, for these women, both challenge and authenticity were to the fore in early career. Decisions they made included actively seeking a promotion and continuing to pursue academic qualifications, while either working full-time or taking study leave.

Mid-career women

Mainiero and Sullivan (2006, p. 120) discussed how in mid-career women “back off to make room for the more relational aspects of their lives.” Women in the KCM studies, who had the support at home of another caregiver continued to pursue challenge, but for those in more egalitarian situations the beta career pattern was followed with a movement toward balance. In this present study, one woman evidenced the beta pattern and chose to spend extended time at home with preschool aged children; she was the exception in this research.

For other women, such as Amanda and Tina it was the norm to have a dual career partnership, sometimes described as a “front seat” career with a partner who pursued a less pressured career pathway. These women worked in leadership positions as tertiary lecturer and member of the professoriate. Amanda described how she was prescient about her choice of husband:

My husband’s not a career man… I wear the pants. At school, a lot of the Mums are not working much, and their partners have high career stress. My partner doesn’t have that stress. I thought of that when I was dating. He was the third man who proposed and he was just right. I thought if I had somebody who was putting on a business suit every day and maxing out at night, there’s no life for me. Having his down-to-earth approach, gives me the freedom to decide on my next step.

These women maintained the attitude that when decisions need to be made around career transitions, it was often their own career that came first, their partner’s career decisions needed to fit in. Tina said:

My husband is supportive, he has the attitude: “You apply wherever you want, I can find a job anywhere.” Being in academia there’s limited places you can go; you have to have someone who can fit around you. All the decisions I made when I came back to work were mine. I talked with my husband about them, but they were all driven by me.

Having a supportive partner contributed not only to Amanda and Tina’s ability to continue to progress and seek challenge mid-career but also to maintain perspective. They made comments such as, “The other thing that keeps me going is I’ve got a wonderful man who says to me, ‘Don’t take it all too seriously.’” They benefitted from the positive “cross-over effect” and well-being of having a partner who is an “ally” for their career (Litano et al., 2014).

Further, these women’s partners take an equal or major share of the childcare and running of the household, being available in the weekends so that they can study or work. They considered this the “normal” way of managing the work–home interface and experienced positive crossover effects among couples due to their spouses’ nontraditional gender role orientation. Conflict was reduced for them due to the support of their partner both in their career decision-making and practically (Livingston & Judge, 2008). They were able to cope with shared caregiving and household and tasks as their partner adopted strongly egalitarian gender role ideology (Kailasapathy et al., 2014).

When they discussed balance, it was not at the forefront but rather it was fused together with both authenticity and challenge. Tina has attempted to come to terms with what “other” women do aware her leadership position is tempered by her family’s needs:

I want balance. I’m happy being internationally recognised for some things but not being that sort of world-class person that travels every month to speak at some conference. My family would not cope, if I did all that travelling. As it is, my daughter is quite clingy and doesn’t like it when I go for my one [overseas] conference a year. So I never want to be that person. I used to think I’m never going get there and be a bit depressed, but now I’m happy.

Tina explicitly says she wants balance, still she actively pursues challenges as an academic while at the same time she strives to be authentic, as her career provides her with identity and reputation:

I like having my own reputation; otherwise you get pigeon holed as the mother or the wife of so and so. “Oh, you’re the person who always talks about such and such on the radio.” Without my work I wouldn’t have that.

The three KCM parameters of challenge, balance, and authenticity are all apparent in the career pattern of Tina and Amanda who continue to seek challenge in mid-career. These women demonstrate the alpha career pattern Mainiero and Sullivan (2006) described as typical of most men and single, career-driven women rather than a beta career pattern with a move toward balance. However, these two women are both married and have children.

Tina and Amanda had sought to pursue an individual pathway early in their careers. As with the women in early career, the theme of authenticity was established early and continued to develop throughout their careers. A beta career pattern identifies a trend for women once “freed from balance issues” to begin to craft their own identities; the movement toward authenticity occurs in late career (Mainiero & Sullivan, 2006, p. 131). However, these women sought both authenticity and challenge throughout their careers with minimal evidence of them “pulling away” to manage relational aspects of their lives.

Late career women

Helen and Sally, senior managers in a tertiary institution and a secondary school, were women in late career who had worked for over 25 years. They had coped with various challenges including redundancy and restructuring. They indicated they needed to achieve greater balance at this career stage for self-care and to reevaluate. Helen comments:

I’d actually like to just be at home, making bread and knitting my dishcloths, reading, and growing plants. People say, “Oh, you’d be lonely.” I wouldn’t. They have very cozy lives some of my friends. Their husbands are earning tonnes of money, so they do things like be a teacher aide, have lots of holidays, work three days a week and have a cleaner. I’d love that. I’m sick of working. Not much chance of that I’m afraid. But not much chance of that I’m afraid. Pete would never say. That’s okay, I’ve got another 20 years working, and I’ll support you. I think I choose people who are not going to say - Don’t worry darling. What I would like, thank you very much, is a lovely 65-year-old who’s extremely well off and says: ‘Darling, you can retire, we need to do a bit of travelling.’ That would suit me fine. I’d be out of here. I think about that next transition and how I would do it. I think about it all the time.

Helen appears weary. After a diverse career in education, she desires balance and some time for herself, a preference commensurate with many men in Mainiero and Sullivan’s (2006) sample. As the major “breadwinner,” Helen considers work has taken its toll, and has lost any sense of challenge or “thrill.”

Sally, previously a Deputy Principal for two decades had recently experienced a workplace restructure that resulted in a new role:

I was one of the Deputy Principals. I said “I’ll put my head on the block.” I’m usually a fighter and I could have forced things so all the Deputy Principals lost one management unit. I was willing to make it easier for the Board but I didn’t go like a timid rabbit; I went on my terms. I made sure I still had something. I was pretty stretched from being a Deputy Principal, and I wanted to be able to survive somehow until I was 65 [usual retirement]. I didn’t want to go out in a box before that.

Her new role was less challenging, which meant Sally could restore some balance in her life, which came as a relief. Further, she considers she achieved it on her “own terms” and has not been compromised. A third woman in late career, Debbie, a career academic, had also been through a restructuring process. However, for her it resulted in redundancy that she described as “extremely brutal,” “a nightmare,” and “a personal attack.”

Earlier in their careers, for these women, being authentic in their work meant they found meaning and enjoyed career satisfaction (Murphy & Volpe, 2015). However, by late career they had experienced significant times of vulnerability; at these times being true to themselves was not easy. Sally discovered this when a close colleague, whom she trusted, betrayed her trust and the situation became irreparable, an experience that made her question how much of her “true self” she should bring to her work (Hall & Mao, 2015).

These comments reveal the “dark side” of contemporary career experiences identified by Baruch and Vardi (2016). Sally, Debbie, and Helen are somewhat disillusioned with their career. Their need for authenticity is suppressed as they work toward surviving “somehow until I’m 65” and continuing to make a living. Chronic experiences have resulted in burnout and disengagement. They are keen to achieve more balance in their lives and to achieve personal harmony and work flexibility they now choose to “lean back” (Major & Burke, 2013). Yet, although they have experienced challenging transitions, there is no evidence that they need to “define identities of their own,” neither are they single career-driven women, who follow an alpha career pattern (Mainiero & Sullivan, 2006, p. 131).

Conclusions

The purpose of this paper was to explore the careers of professional women across the life course and to identify whether the choices they made are captured by the career patterns identified in the KCM. A number of key findings were derived from the study.

First and most importantly, the three parameters of authenticity, balance, and challenge overlapped at different stages of the women’s lives. They articulated a desire for authenticity and to be true to themselves (Hall & Mao, 2015) and were clear about their need to seek feedback and to gain insight from their past actions (Ryan, Huta & Deci, 2008). Authenticity undergirded and incited these women’s career decisions from the outset and continued throughout their career progression into mid-career. Rather than being distinct from balance and challenge, authenticity was established and incorporated both challenge and balance. Their persistent seeking of authenticity emerged as a trademark of the careers of these women working in education.

Second, neither the two women in early career nor those in mid-career opted out; they chose to opt-in. These women described themselves as driven; they pushed themselves and seized opportunities to achieve career goals and progress their careers. They continued to be engaged in pursuing a career and to maintain focus on challenge. Returning to study and actively seeking promotion were trademarks of their career pathways. They chose to opt-in rather than to opt-out. They did seek balance, yet their relationships, in particular a keenly supportive partner, mean rather than “pulled out” they are sustained through their career challenges.

Third, these women demonstrated a clear alpha career pattern of both challenge and authenticity in early career, a pattern that continued in mid-career as they maintained strong involvement in their careers. Although in a female-dominated occupation they exhibited a more typically male career pattern, rather than the female beta career pattern of a move to balance in mid-career.

Fourth, in this research, the women’s accounts reveal they are embedded in a web of relationships, and that their decisions are indeed contextual (O’Neil et al., 2013). Significantly, they managed these relationships adroitly, and rather than constraining, these relationships provided support and positive well-being; they were a help rather than a hindrance. These women were all involved in dual career partnerships within which their career tended to take “a front seat” role. Further, their career decisions took precedence over those of their partner in decision-making who was often described as having less career stress than themselves. Their partners recognized these women’s career aspirations and would either adjust their own career and/or take a larger share of family responsibilities. Women attested to the positive well-being gained from their partner’s support and that their egalitarian practices were a key part of their career success. The advocacy of a supportive partner enabled them to pursue challenge and continue to seek authenticity throughout mid-career, while maintaining a sense of balance during this period. That is, a woman’s partner was an “ally” to her career progression (Litano et al., 2014). The beta career pattern portrays women’s career progress as being constrained by relationships; consequently, women’s ability to strongly pursue an individual pathway in mid-career is diminished. In this study, relationships were a help rather than a hindrance to career progression.

Fifth, women in late career had experienced career setbacks such as restructuring and redundancy. Their search for authenticity meant that they were working in different roles than at mid-career and had worked toward achieving greater work–life balance in their lives. Findings expose the “dark” side of career where a search for authenticity was often curbed in order to continue to make a living (Baruch & Vardi, 2016).

Future research

Hermeneutic phenomenological research has several advantages for researching career. It enables a subjective viewpoint. It has the power to uncover details which might appear insignificant as a search for meaning making is undertaken, first in the interview setting and second in the hermeneutic analysis of transcript data. The process produces a composite description of the phenomenon through the creation of overarching themes. This means that study findings can have potential to be applied in different settings, enabling connection with other human experiences. Country specifics may limit the application of the findings to other western countries, and sweeping generalizations and implications from a study of this size within hermeneutic methodology necessarily must be tenuous. Nevertheless, the study extends the body of knowledge of what is known about women’s careers and raises important questions as to how career patterns are changing.

Future research that involves both members of DCCs and a wider range of couples, e.g. same sex couples, could include longitudinal studies enabling career changes and transitions for both partners to be studied simultaneously. Women in this study were all partnered and in good health, factors which have implications for career decision-making. More research is needed to determine whether there is a growing convergence between men and women’s careers, however what this study does indicate is that the gendered patterns of career models such as the KCM may be shifting. This research is part of recent work critiquing and extending our understanding of women’s careers applying KCM concepts (Clarke, 2015; Cohen, 2014; Shaw & Leberman, 2015). More research is required to determine the long-term effects on alpha women as to how they can maintain focus on career challenge. Research is also required to determine the needs of future generations and to provide recommendations for human resource professionals and career consultants. It is important to continue to study both men and women as shifts in the structure and complexity of careers affect theories for both women’s and men’s careers.

Footnotes

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: This research was carried out with the support of a Vice Chancellor's Doctoral Scholarship.

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