The Perceived Career Support, Protean Career Orientation, and Subjective Career Success: Multiple Mediating Effects of Person-Job Fit and Career Self-Management in the Workplace

Abstract

Background/Objectives: The present study aimed to examine the relationships among perceived career support, protean career orientation, and subjective career success in the workplace. Moreover, we investigated the mediating roles of person-job fit and career self-management.
Methods/Statistical analysis: One-hundred and eighty-four employees from a large Korean University Hospital participated in this study for compensation. Participants completed a survey that is administered to evaluate structural relationships among the study variables. The multi-item scales were used to measure all of the study variables. To test of our research model, we used a structural equation modeling with bootstrapping mediation approaches to confirm significance of indirect effects.
Findings: The results demonstrated that all constructs in this study have stable factor structures and acceptable reliability. Our results showed the person-job fit had significant mediation effects on the relationship between protean career orientation (PCO) and subjective career success, as well as the relationship between perceived career support and subjective career success. However, the mediation effect of career self-management behavior was not statistically significant and relatively weak on those relationships. It is noted that differently from previous research on career self-management, our findings suggest that the mediation effect of the Person-Job fit is stronger than one of career self-management, at least for the employee’s perception of career success. Therefore, organizational management should consider the fit between person and job, for improving successful individual career outcomes in employees going forward.
Improvements/Applications: This study could be improved if a comparison between jobs of various work settings is tested.