LIFELONG GUIDANCE SYSTEMS DEVELOPMENT: VIEWS OF CAREER EXPERTS – A QUALITATIVE STUDY
This article describes a qualitative study of the experiences, understandings, and conceptions of lifelong guidance systems of a sample of career experts based in different work settings, and mainly in European countries. It aims to elucidate how such systems develop and to identify features of effective systems and of their future development. The outcome is a four-fold category of lifelong guidance systems: minimal, aspirational, strategic, and systemic.
The article is a welcome introduction to the world of systems development as it applies to lifelong guidance, a very under-researched area of career guidance delivery. As the authors point out, lifelong guidance systems are mainly conceptualisations in a context where the reality is a disparate collection of subsystems, each with their own aims, objectives, and intended outcomes. A mapping of the latter in any country, and the role of career guidance within each, may provide more concrete insights on how to better integrate such subsystems in a lifelong guidance framework, and lead to more conceptual and concrete coherence.