Purpose: This paper explores the career anchors of third sector social enterprise managers in the UK. A career anchor is described as the constellation of self-perceived attitudes, talents, values and needs that develop over time. It guides and influences the individual’s selection of specific occupations, work settings and his/her career paths (Schein 1978, 1990). Since the development of Schein’s (1978, 1990) career anchor model there have been several studies conducted using the model to understand the career anchors of academics (Tan and Quack, 2001; Custodian, 2004), IT personnel (Katz, 1993; Ramakrishna and Petoskey, 2003; Chang et al., 2012) and private and public sector managers (Kniveton, 2004; Garavan et al., 2006; Wong, 2007; Rasdi et al, 2009). However, there is insufficient research that has explored the career anchors of third sector social enterprise managers. Given this gap in research, this paper seeks to identify the dominant career anchors of small third sector social enterprise operational managers. The identification of the career anchors of social enterprise managers is significant for small social enterprise organisations seeking to retain managers; not through the promise of high salaries but through proving opportunities that will match manager’s career needs.
Design/methodology - a mixed method research design was employed. A survey and semi-structured interviews were conducted with forty operational managers working in eight social enterprise organisations in three UK regions (East Midlands, South East (including London), Yorkshire and Humber).The research questions are:
i. What are the dominant career anchors of social enterprise managers?
ii. Is there a relationship between social enterprise career anchors and the job environment?
Findings/Originality/Value – The findings make an important contribution to the field of managerial career anchors in small social enterprise organisations by identifying operational managers’ dominant career anchors which are not linked to monetary needs influence their career needs. It provides an empirical support for the use of Schein’s (1978, 1990) career anchor model as a tool to measure social enterprise managerial career anchors in the third sector.
Keywords: Career anchors, social enterprise managers, third sector
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Social enterprise, human resource management, employment creation and job quality
