Multiple Perspectives on Career Scripts: Theoretical and Empirical Insights: Annual Academy of Management Meeting

This symposium presents recent developments in research on ‘career scripts’ (Barley, 1989) to inform our theoretical understanding of questions about the interdependence between the individual and organizations. The concept of career scripts can be traced back to Barley’s (1989: 53) original definition as the “interpretive schemas, resources and norms that structure people’s career
within an organization”. More recently, career scripts have attracted a renewed interest, indicating the theoretical usefulness of this concept for our understanding of the relationship between individuals and organizations. Yet, the recent literature also highlights significant differences in the conceptualizations of career scripts, suggesting a multiplicity and fragmentation of perspectives, some of which departing significantly from the sociological roots that informed Barley’s original writing on the topic. In response, this symposium invites a scholarly debate to foster a nuanced and explicit conceptualization of career scripts and to contribute to the theoretical contribution of this collective stream of research.