Future Work Self: Sturcture And Motivation Effect

In the past few decades, essential changes have taken place in the job market, and individuals’ career became unpredictable, discontinuous and boundaryless, so individuals needed to be more active in managing their career to succeed. Future work self, the representations of the self in the future that encapsulate individually significant hopes and aspirations in relation to work, receives more and more attention by its motivation function in proactive career behaviors. However, little empirical researches have been done to discuss the structure and motivation effect of future work self. Therefore, we carried out the following two studies:Research One:the structure of future work self. Conducted with a sample of 227 employees, the structure of future work self came out by using content analysis and bottom-up coding method. Results showed the structure of future work self contains four categories:primary concerns, including work income, working pressure, working hours, working environment; social concerns, including interpersonal communication, power, status; quality concerns, including, working style, stability, interest, profession.; self concerns, including personal growth, independent, working state, achievement, ability, innovation.Research Two:the motivation effect of future work self. Conducted questionnair-e survey with a sample of 335 employees, results showed future work self with motivation capacity should have the characteristics of perceived control, accessibility, cost and salient. The order of their effect size from large to small was perceived control, accessibility, cost and salient. Besides, the study of the relationships between proactive personality, future work self, career adaptability and career engagement showed controlling the effect of proactive personality to career adaptability and career engagement, the future work self can bring incremental validity for forecasting; career adaptability partially mediated the effect of future work self on career engagement; future work self partially mediated the effect of proactive personality on career adaptability.Finally, for each study, the limitations, improvement suggestions and tentative ideas of future research were discussed; the theoretical and practical implications were provided.