Volume 9, Issue 2, June 2016

Test Book

Intrapreneurial Self-Capital: A concept fitting a life-designing intervention
Intrapreneurial Self-Capital: A concept fitting a life-designing intervention

Annamaria Di Fabio

Department of Education and Psychology, University of Florence, Italy

Raoul Van Esbroeck

Department of Educational Science, Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Belgium

Sommario

Applying the life-design paradigm requires the development of new methods, materials and constructs. The studies on the concept of adaptability and an internationally validated scale to measure it constitute the first result of such an effort. The recently developed construct of Intrapreneurial Self-Capital (ISC) could be another construct that might help enhance the application of a life-design approach. This article illustrates how ISC fits the life-design paradigm and how it might contribute towards a career management framework.

Parole chiave

Intrapreneurial Self-Capital construct; Intrapreneurial Self-Capital Training; life-design paradigm.

Abstract

Keywords

Intrapreneurial Self-Capital construct; Intrapreneurial Self-Capital Training; life-design paradigm.

The life-design paradigm was described for the first time in 2009 by the International Life Design Research Group (Savickas et al., 2009). In their position paper, the authors devote ample attention to the implications of their new concept for career interventions. The life design intervention framework should be life-long, holistic, contextual and preventive. Within this framework the counsellors should aim at increasing the clients’ adaptability, narratability, activity and intentionality (Savickas et al., 2009).

The new approach, however, requires the development of “life-designing intervention models, methods, and materials” that need “to linguistically and operationally define central constructs” (Savickas et al., 2009, p. 249). The Research prioritised the study of the concept of adaptability. An international research team including colleagues from 13 countries the world over developed an international psychometric scale with wide cross-cultural validity that allows career adaptability to be measured. The results of this collaboration were published in a special issue of the Journal of Vocational Behavior in 2012 (Leong & Walsh, 2012). It was the first collaborative effort to create an instrument - The Career Adapt-Ability Scale - that allows counsellors to measure the clients’ level of development with regard their ability of coping with change. It is a higher order and an aggregate construct that includes a matrix of lower level “specific attitudes, beliefs, and competencies… which shape the actual problem-solving strategies and behaviours (i.e. adapting) that individuals use to synthesize their vocational self-concepts and developmental task.” (Savickas & Porfeli, 2012, p. 663).

This step that was taken to expand resources in support of life design intervention should be considered as a first effort only. Other key constructs and concepts in life-design may require similar attention. It can be expected that higher order concepts in particular may be useful to contribute to the development of a life-long, holistic, contextual and preventive approach. This is even more so the case within the broader field of industrial and organizational psychology as Savickas and his colleagues (2009) indicated in their closing reflections. More in particular in relation to the aspect of career management the life-design counselling approach could play an essential role.

Di Fabio (2014b) proposed within an organizational psychology setting geared towards young adults and adults the construct of Intrapreneurial Self-Capital (ISC). She also developed a scale to measure it, i.e. the Intrapreneurial Self-Capital Scale (ISCS). The construct and scale are based on the identifying and measuring of an individual’s characteristics which are crucial to the role of a person who has as an intrapreneur to manage his/her own life. It is – exactly as the construct of career adaptability – a higher order concept that refers to a core of individual intrapreneurial resources that enable a person to cope with present career and life construction challenges. These challenges are related to instability, unpredictability and transitions typical of the 21st century. At the centre of the endeavour are the competencies that allow a person to deal with the frequent changes and transitions by creating innovative solutions. In particular, attention is devoted to the issue of how to act when confronted with constraints imposed by the environment and which skills are required to turn these constraints into resources.

The word Capital in the new construct refers to the possession – the wealth - of a specific set of characteristics, skills, attitudes, competencies that every individual owns. This set of characteristics moulds the self of the individual and forms the basis on which an individual will manage his life. Using this terminology is in line with the concept of Psychological Capital - a concept that refers to an “individual’s positive psychological state of development” (Luthans, Youssef, & Avolio, 2007, p. 3). The psychological capital is characterized by the psychological resources of self-efficacy, hope, optimism and resilience.

The phrase Intrapreneurial Self also requires some explanation, because it highlights the close relationship with the profile of intrapreneurs as identified in the organizational psychology literature. Intrapreneurs are persons who develop their innovative ideas within the organization in which they operate; they accept the organizational limitations, but are strongly committed to the implementation of their innovative ideas even when confronted with organizational change and possible organizational conflicts (Honig, 2001). This is exactly the kind of approach needed when an individual is confronted with the start of a new chapter in his/her life and career story. The individual as an intrapreneur should act within the broader global self, deal with the environmental limitations and face possible inconsistencies in his/her life story. This is the kind of behaviour that can be identified through the Intrapreneurial Self-Capital construct.

As part of this contribution, the authors will illustrate how this new construct fits in with the life design interventions within a career management setting. What an intervention program could look like and how an increase in the level of Intrapreneurial Self-Capital may indirectly affect the career adaptability and other key aspects of a life-design.

The construct of Intrapreneurial Self-Capital

The higher order construct of intrapreneurial self-capital is defined as “the positive self-evaluation of the self-concept, to feel in control over life events, to creatively solve problems, to change constraints into resources, to develop one’s own skills, to apply decision-making skills to every aspect of life, and to make decision carefully” (Di Fabio, 2014b, p. 100). It consists of seven specific sub-constructs (i.e. core self-evaluation, hardiness, creative self-efficacy, resilience, goal mastery, decisiveness, vigilance).

The first sub-construct is the Core Self-Evaluation (Judge, Erez, Bono, & Thorensen, 2003) related to a positive self-concept in terms of self-esteem, self-efficacy, locus of control, and the absence of pessimism.
The second sub-construct is Hardiness as an individual composite of beliefs about the self and the world and how to stay in relation with this world; it includes three dimensions: commitment, control and challenge (Maddi, 1990).
The third specific construct, Creative Self-efficacy, is related to an individual’s perception of the ability to face and creatively solve problems. It includes the perception to hold problem solving skills and to be able to generate new ideas (Tierney & Farmer, 2002).
The fourth sub-construct, Resilience, is the perceived ability to cope with adversity in an adaptive way and to use adaptive strategies to deal with discomfort and adversity (Tugade & Fredrickson, 2004).
The fifth construct is Goal Mastery. It refers to continually developing skills and reaching the highest possible level of performance in tasks that can contribute to this outcome (Midgley et al., 2000).
The sixth specific construct is Decisiveness, defined as the perceived ability to make decisions in a timely manner in any life context (Frost & Shows, 1993).
The seventh construct is Vigilance, a decision-making adaptive style defined as a careful and adaptive search for relevant information and the careful evaluation of each option before making a choice (Mann, Burnett, Radford, & Ford, 1997).

Each of the sub-constructs described above are to some extent connected to characteristics found among intrapreneurs. The Core Self-Evaluation, for example, can be seen as a positive self-concept related to self-esteem, self-efficacy, internal locus of control, and low neuroticism (Ronen, 2010). The Hardiness construct reflects qualities such as tenacity/persistence, vision (anticipator of possible problems), and dislike of repetition, (Davis, 1999). The same author also refers to the connection between Creative Self-Efficacy and Resilience and intrapreneurship (Davis, 1999). Goal Mastery is identified by Honig (2001) as an intrapreneurial characteristic linked to the desire to learn continually. Decisiveness is seen as related to the intrapreneurial characteristics of feeling free and autonomous in making decisions and self-determination in decision-making (Menzela, Aaltiob, & Ulijna, 2007). Finally, vigilance is also an intrapreneurial characteristic referring to the perceived ability to plan in uncertain environments, to the feeling environments are being mastered while being studied in depth, and to the adaptive and strategic use of information (Lubkins & Kans, 2007).

The importance of the selected sub-constructs lies into the strong relationship between these constructs, including the higher level construct of Intrapreneurial Self-Capital, and some outcomes in the career decision and development process. All constructs are positively associated with performance, employability, career decision-making self-efficacy and the absence of career decision-making difficulties (see Di Fabio, 2014b).

The role of Intrapreneurial Self-Capital in career management

The Intrapreneurial Self-Capital concept is largely related to the context of career psychology where each individual is seen as a collaborator in an organization in which he/she is engaged. The organization needs to be interpreted very broadly. It can be more than one organization ranging from a business or another type of organization to an educational institution. Educational experience is indeed an integral part of a person’s career. Even the persons themselves can be seen as organizations (Van Esbroeck, 2011). This change of perspective is required by the new reality of the 21^stcentury characterized by unpredictability and instability in which the career no longer belongs to the organization but to the person (Duarte, 2004). The person has to cope with internal and external constraints in the many and continual transitions that follow one other (Guichard, 2009; Guichard & Di Fabio, 2010). The main point here is that the persons are constantly managing their careers. Today, career management extends well beyond the narrow framework of the work aspects. It is more about how “people go about constructing their lives through work, always bearing in mind… that the career of an individual is a faithful record of his/her life” (Duarte, 2009, p. 264).

The issue of career management received a great deal of attention within organizational psychology from the 1960s onwards. Duarte (2009) extensively describes how ideas on career management have developed during the last decades and how societal and organizational changes influenced these developments. Guichard (2013) situates the career in the present liquid society, and sees a career relying on a set of different competencies. He refers to the intelligent career concept (DeFilippi & Arthur, 1996), which “constructed a notion of career competencies” that fall into three categories: knowing how, knowing whom and knowing why. In particular, the knowing how refers to a set of competencies such as attitudes, values, internal needs, identity and motivation. Guichard (2015) actually calls this a “career capital”. He expands his views on careers in liquid societies with the concept of “identity capital” proposed by Côté (1996). The author refers to individuals investing in who they are and in what they expect their investment to produce in terms of dividends in the future.

These ideas on “capital” are used by Di Fabio (2014b) in building her concept of intrapreneurial-self capital. This new concept identifies a set of specific competencies needed in the career/life management setting. It refers to competencies that are essential to be able to manage or design a person’s career and even a person’s life. In particular, if the person is operating in a liquid society. Career management is no longer seen as a process of adapting to an organization in order to build and maintain a specific self-concept that allows the person to remain within the organization. On the contrary, career management must be seen as a process that allows the person to construct his/her own life story and identity in mutual interrelation with the environment – of which the organization is an essential part.

In the 21^st century career management should indeed be related to the issue of the increase in unpredictable “chaotic” careers (Savickas, 2011c). Individuals need to develop a set of career management skills that enable them to increase their insight into themselves and their environment so they can navigate their own careers (Savickas, 2011a). Individuals also have to develop self management skills, because career management is realised through self-management. Individuals have to maintain their employability and actively manage their careers through adaptability, intentionality, life-long learning, autobiographical reasoning and meaning in line with the concept of the Self as project (Savickas, 2011a). Career management through self-management is an inherently relational act between the dynamic system of subjective identity forms (Guichard, 2009) of the individual and the environmental contexts. It is within this framework that the sub-constructs included in the Intrapreneurial Self-Capital can be considered essential to career management. The possible role and importance of the sub-constructs in career management have been illustrated for some of these constructs by several theoretical models and research results.

The specific sub-construct, Core Self-Evaluation, is a positive self-concept that includes high self-esteem, high self-efficacy, internal locus of control, and absence of pessimism. The core self-evaluation is positively associated with career decision-making self-efficacy, and lack of career decision-making difficulties (Di Fabio, Bar-On, & Palazzeschi, 2012). In addition, several indications are found that aspects of the Core Self-evaluation can have a positive role on career management at all life stages as illustrated, e.g., by the positive youth development model (PYD, Lerner et al., 2005). This theoretical model focuses on improving characteristics among young people that help them to reduce the risk of negative outcomes in career management and to favour their productive participation in society (Kenny, Di Fabio, & Minor, 2014). The Positive Adult Development perspective (AD, Commons, 2002) is another model that illustrates how the capacity to adapt to changes and challenges can improve the quality of life among adults. The Positive Lifelong Development (PLD; Colby & Damon, 1992) underlines the fact that lifelong successful development with optimal health and quality of life can be connected to the person’s positive characteristics and strengths. The role of a positive self-concept is a central issue in the Positive Self and Relational Management (PS&RM, Di Fabio & Kenny, 2016) model. In order to effectively deal with the numerous transitions and the complexity of personal and professional life, individuals should develop their strengths, potentials and varied talents (Di Fabio & Maree, 2012; Di Fabio & Saklofske, 2014).

The importance of elements from the sub-constructs Hardiness and Creative-Self Efficacy have been highlighted by Savickas. The author explicitly refers to the traits of Commitment, Control and Challenge – elements of Hardiness - as important individual characteristics for a successful career management in the 21^st century (Savickas, 2011a). He also suggests that the Creative Self-efficacy is essential to career management because it contributes to “Think outside the box” and to find meaningful solutions for dealing with the challenges of the 21^st century and constructing one’s career.

The sub-construct, Goal Mastery, is particularly significant in a Positive Youth Development perspective (PYD, Lerner et al., 2005). The desire to continuously develop skills, improve oneself and the perception of learning as intrinsically interesting (Midgley et al., 2000) constitutes an important resource for career management in a constantly changing world of work. Several positive relationships between goal mastery and a positive career management can be found. There exists, e.g., a positive relationship between goals mastery and career decision-making self-efficacy and the lack of career decision-making difficulties (Germeijs & Verschueren, 2006).

The sub-construct Decisiveness is an important aspect in career management not only in terms of choosing between some alternatives, but also in terms of constructing one’s own path. This is important because, in the postmodern era, individuals are asked not only to decide/choose, but also to construct (Savickas, 2011a) their personal as well as their professional lives. In the literature, decisiveness is positively associated with variables significant in career management such as employability, career decision-making self-efficacy, and lack of career decision-making difficulties (Di Fabio, Palazzeschi, Asulin-Peretz, & Gati, 2013).

The vigilance sub-construct plays a role because career management at present requires that individuals deal with inconsistent information about the Self and the world. The process requires that the persons should be able to identify the core Subjective Identity Forms (Guichard, 2009) and be aware that these may be subject to change. Such an approach requires the individual to benefit from a high level of vigilance. This means to be able to work in an adaptive decision-making style (Di Fabio & Kenny, 2012) and to search for information that is relevant at the time and evaluate or re-evaluate each option bearing in mind the reality of the present before making a decision.

The importance of some ISC sub-constructs in the career management process is undeniable. The relationship between a high level of intrapreneurial self-capital – as measured by the ISCS - and positive outcomes of an adequate career management process have been experimentally illustrated. Di Fabio (2014b) found a positive relationship between the ISCS scores and school performance (GPA) illustrating the importance of intrapreneurial individual characteristics on school performance. Furthermore, a positive relationship between ISCS and both perceived employability and career decision-making self-efficacy was also found, while the negative relationship with career decision-making difficulties supports the importance of intrapreneurial self-capital. In this study (Di Fabio, 2014b), ISCS has been correlated .32 (p < .01) with the Grade Point Average, .36 (p < .01) with perceived employability, .46 (p < .01) with career decision-making self-efficacy, and -.26 with career decision-making difficulties (p < .01).

How does Intrapreneurial Self-Capital fit the life-design paradigm?

The life-design paradigm is to a large extent strongly connected to the liquid society, a concept described by Guichard (2013, 2015) on the basis of the ideas of Bauman (2000). Persons living in a liquid society will face important changes in how to manage a career. Indeed, they need to fundamentally switch their attitude towards the career management process. Today, individuals could concentrate on a “planning attitude” and define a future goal that matches their personal profiles. In the liquid society of the 21^st century, a “strategic attitude” (Guichard, 2013) is required. This means that individuals anticipate the option of a future opportunity (goal) while taking into account the present situation and at the same time identifying the available resources to realize this opportunity.

Such an attitude shift requires a specific set of new skills, competencies and attitudes. The competencies needed to develop the new attitude are related to the recognition of the individual’s vocational self-concepts and the sense of need to construct a self that fits the environmental situation(s) in which the person operates. The concept of intrapreneurial Self-Capital includes several skills, competencies, attitudes that appear to be essential to this process of attitude change and successful engagement with a life design project.

The original position paper of the Life Design Research Group (Savickas et al., 2009) refers indirectly to the characteristics within the person that may improve the life design process. It concerns adapt-ability, narratability, activity and intentionality. Adapt-ability includes variables such as: concern (a tendency to consider life from a perspective of hope and optimism), control (to use self-regulation strategies and adjust to different settings), curiosity (active self exploration of the different possible selves), confidence (to be able to face obstacles and to continue to adhere to one’s own aspirations and objectives) and commitment (not to digress from one’s life projects and generate new possibilities). Some of these aspects are also included in the measuring of intrapreneurial self-capital. Several examples can be found when comparing the description of the aspects commitment and control in the adapt-ability construct. Commitment and control appear within the Hardiness sub-construct and in the aspect of generating new ideas and creative solutions as part of the Creative Self-efficacy sub-construct. The same is also true for the aspect of concern and confidence within the adapt-ability concept. These aspects re-appear in the Resilience sub-concept where reference is made to resisting stressful events/situations and using this attitude positively to reorganize one’s own life. The Vigilance sub-construct also partly overlaps with adaptability. In particular, aspects of taking care of one’s career and life project (concern), being responsible for one’s own choices (control) and searching for relevant information (curiosity) are present in both concepts. In addition, however, vigilance includes elements of evaluating relevant information and evaluating each option before making a choice, which are not part of the adaptability construct.

The ISC construct includes the career adapt-ability construct essential to life-design, but goes well beyond it. That there is a convergence between the two constructs is confirmed in a first study conducted among secondary school (N = 157) and college students (N = 101), and also on a group of adults (managers) (N = 53), where a moderate significant level of correlation is found of respectively at .40, .48 and .37 for the overall scores on the ISCS and the career adaptability scale (Di Fabio, in press). This result is largely connected to the similarities between the career adaptability variables confidence and control with the ISC sub-variables. The moderate overlap supports the expectation that there are other elements in ISC that play a key role on how to operate in organisational settings and how environmental challenges and constraints are handled. The extent to which career adaptability and intrapreneurial self-capital variables are essentially different is illustrated by the results of a preliminary study (Di Fabio, in press) on the analysis of how variables from both constructs predict Hedonic Well-being (Kahneman, Diener, & Schwarz, 1999).

The results of multiple regression analysis indicate that Intrapreneurial Self-capital is the key variable for predicting hedonic-well being, contributing significantly to explain 32% of the global model variance, while the Career Adaptability variable does not lead to a significant increase in the same model.

The aspect of self-efficacy forwarded by Guichard (2013) as being a factor that plays a major role in career and life management is found in the Core Self-evaluation sub-construct within intrapreneurial self-capital. Furthermore, defining and redefining new expectations and norms, and the revising the identity in a context of changing environments are considered important for life design. These aspects are to some extent part of the challenge dimensions of Hardiness within intrapreneurial self-capital.

It can be concluded that when assessing the intrapreneurial self-capital of a person a large number of competencies, skills and attitudes are measured, which are in line with the life designing paradigm. Additional elements are however added. Career adaptability refers more to the orientation of exploring future opportunities, recognising the importance of how choices influence the future. In this perspective, the ISC concept adds to the individuals’ potential to change the schemes that refer to their level of adaptation and flexibility in uncertain contexts. ISC includes elements of the capacity to change and the ability to take calculated risks for the realisation of the self.

Intrapreneurial Self-Capital Training

Further experimental results will be needed to show how the ISC concept contributes to successful career and life development and how the insight it provides goes well beyond the career adaptability concept. In order to achieve such results an essential element will be the development of an intervention method that can influence the ISC profile of a person.

A framework for a training program to enhance the ISC profile has been developed (Di Fabio, 2014c, 2014e). Two versions of a training program have been developed. The shorter is divided into five weekly sessions of four hours each. The longer version includes five weekly session of eight hours. The first part of the sessions in the longer version is the same as in the shorter version, but a number of specific exercises are added in the longer version to enhance each of the ISC components.

Training starts with a first session centred round the exercise “The book of my life story” to stimulate reflection on one’s own whole life. The exercise also includes reflection on “The future chapter of my life story”. The next three sessions address the components of ISC. The second session is about positive self-concept and hardiness, the third session about creative self-efficacy and resilience, the fourth session about goal mastery, decisiveness and vigilance. The exercises within each session are organized in three levels: a first level to stimulate reflection for the self-evaluation of each ISC component, a second level to favour the recognition of particular positive elements in relation to each ISC component and a third level to identify elements within past, present and future chapter/s in the person’s life story, which positively express the components of ISC. The chapter or chapters has or have to be graphically underlined and then used in a thought process about reasons and characters that can be used to express ISC components in the best possible way. Having gone through the three levels of the exercises, an in-depth reflection on each ISC construct and its importance are provided. Finally, specific exercises to enhance each specific component are given to the participants. The fifth session is focused on a thought validation to reach new authorship in building the next chapter in one’s own life-story. The focus is on personal strategies to achieve full expression and enhancement of the individual ISC.

Each session of the ISC enhancement training program is built around the life-long, holistic, contextual and preventive approach as proposed by Savickas and colleagues (2009), which is central to a life-design intervention. The first session is designed according to the characteristics of a life design intervention; it is a narrative intervention with reflective stimulations. Life design interventions are characterized by a narrative perspective where individuals construct their own selves and stories through narration (Savickas et al., 2009). The process of narrating and reflecting upon their own unique stories helps individuals to integrate personal and cultural stories to form life themes that bring cohesion to their lives and can provide direction in continuing to live their lives (Savickas, 2005). It provides training for in-depth reflection on the ISC to construct the two key meta-competences for the 21st century (adaptability and identity) and for purposeful identitarian awareness (Di Fabio, 2014d), while enhancing each of the specific components of the ISC.

The second session also fits into a life design intervention. The enhancement of the Positive Self-Concept can be considered the basis for optimal life-long management. The aspects involved are major ingredients in every moment and phase of one’s own life to better express ourselves in relation to the complexity of contexts and relationships in the 21st century. The enhancement of Hardiness fits in because it is contextual and preventive. It is contextual as it enables a balance to be achieved between the various life roles that individuals play in their life theatres. It is preventive in as much as it facilitates the identification of possible future goals, engagement in (stressful) new experiences to which individuals can respond in adaptive fashion, and in as much as it actively and adaptively addresses life/career transitions.

The third session is in line with a life design intervention because the enhancement of Creative Self-Efficacy is holistic, contextual and preventive. It is holistic because creative self-efficacy can help individuals manage the different roles in their lives. It is contextual because it allows individuals to creatively explore all the life theatres in which a person can perform different roles. It is preventive as it refers to an important individual characteristic, which is to creatively deal with and solve problems in different contexts and to produce new ideas. The enhancement of Resilience fits the holistic and preventive approach. It is holistic because resilience is an important characteristic that enables individuals to cope in an adaptive way in each of the roles they play in their lives. It is preventive because resilience means not wasting strengths and being able to stay away from negative solutions and not giving up.

The fourth session also fits the characteristics of a life design intervention as the strengthening of Goal Mastery is life-long and preventive. It is life-long because goal mastery continually facilitates the development of one’s own skills to better express and improve. It is preventive because the continuing enhancement of individual skills can help individuals to better deal with the complex transitions in their personal and professional lives. Also, the enhancement of Decisiveness is in accordance with the characteristics of a life design intervention, because it is holistic and preventive. It is holistic because the ability to make timely decisions concerns all the roles individuals play in different contexts. It is preventive as it helps to satisfy the need to make life/career decisions and choices that effectively deal with transitions and the possible future Self/Selves. Also the enhancement of Vigilance fits in with the characteristics of a life design intervention, because it is holistic, contextual and preventive. It is holistic because vigilance puts the career role at the centre of attention, defining and redefining new expectations and norms, and revising identity according to changing contexts. It is contextual because vigilance encourages individuals to consider many elements in the different contexts when making important choices for individual life and career construction. It is preventive as it encourages individuals to carefully and adaptively search for relevant information in decisional processes inside and outside themselves to better be able to adapt to the complexity of the 21st century. It means becoming more aware of consistent and inconsistent information and the risks associated with self-deception and impression management strategies in building the Self, the future Selves and the future of one’s own life projects. Vigilance is a construct useful in the 21st century, in an actualized perspective; it is linked to purposefulness and purposeful awareness (Di Fabio, 2014d).

The fifth session fits in with the characteristics of a life design intervention in as much as it is aimed at stimulating reflection and encouraging individuals to develop new chapters in their life which allow them enhancing strategies to express themselves at the highest level in an intrapreneurial way and in accordance with the complexity of the contexts and relationships in the 21st century.

The impact of the proposed intervention program has not yet been tested systematically. However, some partial results suggest an effect of the proposed program, showing an increase in ISC for the experimental group between the pre-test and the post-test compared with the control group both among university students and workers (Di Fabio, 2014c, 2014e). These results indicate that the intervention is effective in fostering individual intrapreneurial resources as a means of overcoming environmental constraints and facing the challenges of the 21^stcentury.

Conclusions

The Intrapreneurial Self-Capital is a concept that includes a series of attitudes, competencies and skills which are essential to the career management process. Research results and theoretical models illustrate the fact that each sub-construct within ISC represents elements that are needed to allow individuals to successfully manage and construct their careers in the 21^st century liquid society. Developing a career in the liquid society, however, cannot be separated from the broader life story. The construction of the vocational self is embedded in a dynamic system of interrelationship between the individual and the broader environmental context. The system of subjective identity forms (Guichard, 2005) is broader than the vocational self and is the result of such a confrontation. In this perspective, it can be assumed that the attitudes, competencies and skills used in career management and promoted by ISC can also be beneficial in a life design perspective. This means that the ISC may consequently fit the life-design paradigm. When analysing the characteristics of a life design approach it can be argued that within the ISC construct elements are found which are in line with the life design paradigm. Characteristics that improve the life design process as, e.g., adapt-ability and self-efficacy are included in the ISC concept, but other elements such as, e.g., ability to concentrate on, effective planning, innovation are added. These elements turn the ISC construct into a dynamic construct that focuses on the abilities of implementing actions leading to change and improvement.

The analysis of how the ISC construct fits the life design paradigm illustrates the fact that many concepts used in the broad field of career support may be useful for a life design intervention. In addition to the well known methods used at present such as, e.g., the Career Construction Interview (Savickas, 2013) or the Life Design Dialogue (Guichard, 2015), other intervention methods and models may appear. An intervention that is built around raising the level of mastering the different sub-concepts within ISC can be an option. Such an intervention will help persons acquire a profile that will allow them to improve the career and life construction process. The intervention model, however, should respect a number of essential characteristics of a life design intervention.

First, it should target the counselees as the authors of the stories they are living (Savickas, 2011b). It must give counselees the possibility to include in these stories the information needed to understand the person’s self and how it was constructed (Di Fabio, 2016; Di Fabio & Kenny, 2016; Di Fabio & Maree, 2016). The counselee must be able to describe how different experiences and social environments led to the construction of a system of representations of themselves (Guichard, 2005). The counselees must actually be able to understand the process of mapping and constructing their life themes, vocational personality and adaptability resources (Savickas et al., 2009). This construction process will not be linear but rather a meandering through a series of recurrent mini-cycles of career development and career choice activities (Van Esbroeck, Tibos, & Zaman, 2005). The intervention model should be built around a process of construction, deconstruction, reconstruction, co-construction and action. The intervention model proposed in this contribution fits the above mentioned elements. The first results of the impact of the proposed model when applied in an experimental situation support the potentiality of the intervention. Additional research is, however, a must.

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Autore per la corrispondenza

A. Di Fabio. Fax +39(0)55 6236047. Tel. +39(0)55 2055850.
Indirizzo e-mail: adifabio@psico.unifi.it
Dipartimento di Scienze della Formazione e Psicologia (Sezione di Psicologia), Università degli Studi di Firenze, via di San Salvi, 12 Complesso di San Salvi, Padiglione 26, 50135 Firenze

DOI: 10.14605/CS921611

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Intrapreneurial Self-Capital: A concept fitting a life-designing interventionIntrapreneurial Self-Capital: A concept fitting a life-designing intervention

Intrapreneurial Self-Capital: A concept fitting a life-designing intervention
Intrapreneurial Self-Capital: A concept fitting a life-designing intervention