A person-in-context perspective on care(e)r success: examining (changing) conceptualisations of career success of mid-life women providing informal care for dependent adults

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Oldridge, L ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9915-9959 and Greene, A-M, 2025. A person-in-context perspective on care(e)r success: examining (changing) conceptualisations of career success of mid-life women providing informal care for dependent adults. Human Resource Development International. ISSN 1367-8868

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Official URL: https://doi.org/10.1080/13678868.2025.2557784

Abstract

This article explores the perspectives of career success of mid-life (ages 45–65) women engaging in paid employment alongside informal caring for dependent adults in the United Kingdom (UK). Calendar interviews were conducted with 30 mid-life women in Leicestershire where the focus was on understanding the participants’ own perspectives on career success. Findings demonstrate that following the turning point or career shock of becoming a carer, mid-life women often report changing perceptions of career success towards subjective measures. This extends existing literature on the shaping of career transitions to specifically include the effects of decisions around care responsibilities on perspectives on career success. We demonstrate the utility of the notion of the sustainable career and bring a different perspective to the literature on career success, an important contribution especially as the need to balance informal caring and formal employment has become more prevalent. Finally, we highlight a specific role for Human Resource Development practitioners in managing policy and career conversations with employees beyond objective measures enabling individuals to pursue career success in ways that can integrate work and non-work roles.

Item Type:	Journal article
Publication Title:	Human Resource Development International
Creators:	Oldridge, L. and Greene, A.-M.
Publisher:	Taylor & Francis (Routledge)
Date:	15 September 2025
ISSN:	1367-8868
Identifiers:	Number Type 10.1080/13678868.2025.2557784 DOI 2498578 Other
Rights:	© 2025 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/), which permits non-commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited, and is not altered, transformed, or built upon in any way. The terms on which this article has been published allow the posting of the Accepted Manuscript in a repository by the author(s) or with their consent.
Divisions:	Schools > Nottingham Business School
Record created by:	Laura Borcherds
Date Added:	17 Sep 2025 08:16
Last Modified:	17 Sep 2025 08:16
URI:	https://irep.ntu.ac.uk/id/eprint/54341