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the underpinning

 

Challenging biographies – relocating the theory and practice of careers work



Challenging biographies and third-age guidance:
the use of narratives in guidance work with older age groups

 

Geoff Ford

Senior Consultant for the Third Age Employment Network
Fellow of the National Institute for Careers Education and Counselling
Visiting Associate of the Centre for Guidance Studies at the University of Derby

This article reviews ‘Challenging Biographies’, and considers the role of narrative-based approaches within third-age guidance. It usefully sets the argument in the context of recent research into third-age guidance. The author sees the arguments as helping to explain why many older adults, looking for empathetic listeners who could act as sounding boards for ideas, actually receive the IAG equivalent of ‘a cold shower’. Geoff blames nobody for this. But, he argues, telling one’s own story is a natural human impulse. And it tends to increase as the story gets longer.

Geoff has his reservations about Challenging Biographies. But he looks forward to further work being done on the issues it raises.

Challenging Biographies is a most timely and rewarding symposium of papers on narrative perspectives applied to career guidance and repays detailed study. It could prove to be a landmark in the development of guidance practice. Interest in the use of narrative approaches within guidance in the UK is increasing - driven by the holism that has shaped Connexions policy and by accompanying disenchantment with the increasing bureaucratic control of the guidance agenda. This is widely seen as top-down and target-driven, and designed to meet official requirements rather than individual needs. In these circumstances it is especially refreshing to read so clear and lucid a re-affirmation of the practical and ethical necessity for genuinely client-centred guidance.

The three essays (by Linden West, Bill Law and Hazel Reid) that constitute the heart of the publication, differ considerably in their approaches but complement each other extremely well. In very general terms (because the papers are too rich to summarise properly in a brief description) West’s paper illustrates the value of narrative methodology applied to career through psychotherapeutic approaches based on four case-studies - two of whom are young single parents, one in his 30s, and one woman returner aged 50+. Law’s paper makes a powerful case for the greater use of narrative-led methods within careers education and guidance mainly with young people. Law argues that narrative thinking is more consistent with the way people actually learn through the process of living and as members of families and local communities, and illustrates his thesis with examples drawn from published auto/biographies. Reid’s contribution views narrative methodology through the pragmatic eyes of an experienced practitioner, and provides a nice balance to the two more impassioned papers that precede.

Reid raises questions that will be of concern to all practitioners reading West’s and Law’s papers. They include:

> What are the practical implications of adopting narrative approaches within guidance?
> What are the time and resource implications?
> To what extent would clients welcome telling their story?
> How could the use of narrative best be introduced into guidance practitioner training?

It is to the credit of the editor that these and other questions are explored in some depth in the final and all-important chapter, which is presented in the form of a discussion between West, Law and Reid chaired by the editor, Andrew Edwards. Reid’s pragmatic yet supportive questioning is a continuing theme throughout this discussion, and ensures the participants return regularly to the practicalities of implementation. The authors are in agreement that there is a need for local developments based on guidance practice, and that these should be carefully mapped, evaluated and subjected to collaborative action research - to establish what works and (if so) why it is effective.

A recurring theme throughout Challenging Biographies is the authors’ concern about the eroding effects that the current target culture can have on client-centredness within guidance. In contrast, narrative approaches to guidance place individuals right at the centre of the guidance process. The case for more emphasis on people’s own stories so convincingly set out in Challenging Biographies, is simultaneously a graphic exposition of the reasons why so many clients of all ages are repelled by target-centred guidance.


The importance of individual narrative in third-age guidance

When invited to review Challenging Biographies I was asked specifically to do so within the context of guidance work with older adults. A recent DfES-funded research initiative, the Challenging Age project (Ford et al., 2003), examined the guidance requirements of older adults and the extent to which Information, Advice and Guidance Partnerships and their members are able to respond to these. A condition of the research was all those interviewed should have received guidance from a member organisation of an IAG Partnership. However, many of those interviewed wanted to talk initially about their experiences when attending their local job-centre, normally the first IAG agency visited after being made redundant. The Challenging Age research team found that the reactions of adults aged 45+ towards their visits to job-centres were generally hostile. The papers in Challenging Biographies enable one to see why.

The research shows that older adults, often at a forced transition in their lives because of redundancy from previously long-standing employment with the same company, frequently visit job-centres expecting to discuss their hopes and ambitions for the future. For many adults aged 45+, redundancy appears to provide the opportunity for a career change to an occupational area more in line with interests and values - which may have altered and developed substantially since initial choice of occupation on first leaving education. Frequently, they wish to explore other occupations where they can extend the use and development of skills and experience under-utilised in their previous place of employment. This may include interest in exploring learning and retraining opportunities.

However, the front-line staff in job-centres invariably appeared to their clients as unsympathetic, although the older adults normally recognised the pressures and constraints under which the staff were working. The staff appeared intent on speedy placements to remove the older clients from the unemployment register, and feedback suggests that many advisers were quick to introduce ‘reality’ into the encounter...

"there isn’t much choice at your age and it’s mainly part-time work"

"you can’t expect as good a salary, you’ll have to compromise"

and (commonly)...

"if we submit you for jobs and you refuse to go for interviews because you’re on a training or education course, we’ll have to stop your benefit".

Although Challenging Biographies does not cover the work of job-centres, readers will see clearly that the front-line job-centre staff can be seen to be cutting right across – and indeed often totally ignoring – their clients’ personal stories and the directions in which they hoped their stories, newly released from previous constraints, could now develop. What many older adults were seeking were empathetic listeners skilled in guidance techniques, who could act as ‘sounding boards’ for ideas - which were able to add to the clients’ range of possible opportunities, and were on their side, efficient, interested and able to help. What they actually received was the IAG equivalent of a cold shower – an end to hope and an end to story, at least as the story was evolving in the minds of the clients. The client’s story often appeared to be supplanted by the front-line worker’s story – defined by targets, managerial pressures, the desire for a good quarterly report and (possibly) the prospect of promotion.

These observations are not intended as a criticism of the staff involved. It is difficult to criticise the front-line workers too severely for their behaviour. Challenging Biographies shows very clearly that it is the system which is wrong. Exclusive concentration on targets undermines the client-centred and trusting relationships between individual and helper that lie at the heart of all effective guidance encounters and activities. Indeed. target-driven guidance which shifts the agenda from the client to the adviser, is ultimately self-defeating. Clients are swift to see the alternative agenda and are turned off because their own needs are not recognised. The extent to which client disenchantment with the services they receive may be a factor in helping to explain the large numbers of adults made redundant at 50+ who join the ranks of the ‘hidden unemployed’ and never work again, may never be known.

The Challenging Age research on older workers indicates that guidance providers that are genuinely client-centred are much more likely to achieve positive and sustainable outcomes, because the services they provide are in tune with the wishes and expectations of their clients and are therefore genuinely customer-focused.

In contrast, guidance that runs against the grain of individual narratives may prove to be decidedly counterproductive in terms of helping to harness the country’s wealth of talent and potential, because it ignores the very qualities that the workforce development agenda is aiming to develop. As West and Law demonstrate, guidance that focuses on people’s individual stories simultaneously takes account of such pivotal factors as their abilities, ambitions, hopes, personal circumstances, roles, gender, class, race, feelings, assumptions, beliefs, values and geographical location. The desire to extend one’s skills through appropriate education and training is seen as integral to the inbuilt ambition of many individuals to continue to improve themselves, regardless of age. Where this desire is not in place, it may be the result of countervailing forces including low self-confidence and morale. It should not be the role of official organisations concerned with increasing the national supply of skills, to reinforce the negative.

Although there may be difficulties in making the case at bureaucratic level, the individual factors and considerations that constitute people’s personal narratives, are central to personal action planning and implementation. As such they should also be of pivotal interest to the policy makers, because socio-economic policy that fails to take account of the needs, circumstances and behaviour of individuals is doomed to failure. Macro-policy at national and international levels, and micro-decisions at the individual level may remain unconnected, and progress along two separate and distinct paths.

As all guidance workers who work in any depth with the 45+ know, narrative approaches are an essential element of effective work with older adults. Many older people preface the initial interview by trying to tell their story. A main problem for practitioners is finding sufficient time and resources to listen properly, place the individual and her or his story centre stage, and avoid short cuts that may bypass the individual’s requirements. This is one reason why front-line job-centre advisers are often unable to listen properly – often to their own as well as their clients’ frustration. However, it is difficult to see how third-age guidance can operate effectively unless there are sufficient opportunities for individuals to work through and make sense of their individual narratives.

Telling one’s own story is a natural human impulse which is often undeveloped in the young (and may be further suppressed by shyness and low self-esteem) but which tends to increase as the story gets longer. Older adults often want to ‘tell their story’ to guidance workers and, if the process is handled sensitively, this can be very helpful to the clients. Linden West’s case studies in his opening paper, 'Challenging auto/biographies: careers and guidance in a 5 to 9 world' - which describe West’s work with four individuals struggling to build or rebuild their careers - are especially valuable in enabling us to understand the process. One of the case studies is of a 52- year-old woman beginning to recognise her own potential after years of caring; another is of a man in his 30s with a young family who has experienced several redundancies in insecure employment and is ‘risking’ a vocational degree; and two are of disaffected younger mothers living in East London and both trying to rebuild their lives through community and further education. Although only one of West’s cases is strictly in the 45+ age group, the guidance processes are transferable to older adults. Many older adults share similar experiences to the four individuals featured in the case studies.

The 45+ often bring considerable ‘baggage’ to the guidance situation and want to tell their story in order to make sense of it, to themselves and to others. There may be a strong element of self-justification in the storytelling – understandably so because work is central to individual well-being and negative experiences such as redundancy can shatter self-esteem. The vast majority of older adults want to feel that that their lives have been worthwhile and they have made a positive life contribution. Telling one’s story can help to reinforce one’s sense of self-worth in ways which go well beyond self-justification – as many politicians who have written their own life histories will recognise.

Loss of job may mean loss of community and the human support networks that arise naturally within the workplace. Many redundant individuals may experience considerable isolation and need to communicate with empathetic listeners. For many who have experienced severe loss of purpose and community, story telling may be therapeutic and a helpful way of working through the grieving process.

Many older adults engage in narrative in order to work out what the various elements in their story mean – in the past and present, and also in the future - in terms of planning and taking the story forward. This process presents many opportunities to guidance workers, provided they have time to listen carefully and help in identifying main themes, distinguish the positive features from the negative, and reflect these back to the individual clients. Many 45+ want help in: assessing their skills, abilities and potential and in determining what they can offer to future employers; compiling and writing CVs; and presenting themselves effectively in interviews. Working through one’s personal story with a skilled and empathetic helper who is able to tease out the significant detail is of crucial importance to these and other guidance activities.

The narrative of some older adults may reveal that they have ‘a chip on their shoulder’ - understandable where years of loyal service may have resulted in involuntary job loss, but not helpful in future job-hunting. Skilled guidance workers can help older individuals to develop in self-awareness and recognise the dangers if they reveal the ‘chips’ to future employers. Space for individuals to work through their story at key transition points, reflect, reassess, develop in self-knowledge and then move forward, can contribute to personal health and lead to a healthier - as well as wealthier - society.


The art of listening


Self-evidently, the professional skills of the listener are central to the effective use of narrative approaches within guidance. One of the strengths of Challenging Biographies is its potential to enhance the listening skills of the reader by helping them to listen for and recognise significance and structure in the narrative of the teller - although the writers have not purposely set out to write a training manual. West, Law and Reid are themselves skilled listeners and their abilities are reflected throughout their descriptions of narrative processes, use of case studies, and analyses. These sections, principally composed to communicate the benefits of narrative techniques applied to guidance, also have the added value of heightening the reader’s own awareness. Self-awareness, as all skilled guidance workers know, is an essential prerequisite for successful client-centred guidance including effective listening.


West’s sensitively written case studies and Law’s analysis of published biographical writing are especially helpful in developing the reader’s sensitivity and client orientation. It would be difficult to read either of these two profound and compassionate analyses of people’s lives and the many influences that have shaped - and which continue to shape – them, without also reflecting on one’s own life and those of others one has known, and therefore emerging the more effective listener.


Guidance and the life journey

The especial strength of Law’s paper lies in its vivid reaffirmation of ‘career’ as indivisible from each individual’s journey through life, and the social networks in which people live, move and have their being. For guidance workers consumed with the achievement of outcome-driven targets, Law’s analysis is both salutary and restorative. For older adults concerned that redundancy and other life circumstances mean that their lives may have lacked purpose and been wasted, Law’s analysis and emphasis on the centrality of the life story within guidance is potentially transformational.


The authors of Challenging Biographies stress the role of telling one’s story in helping to clarify and determine action. Many guidance practitioners working with older age groups will share the experience of listening to stories that are a form of premature obituary – 'this is what I was, look at me now'. In his latter days Herbert Sutcliffe, the great Yorkshire opening batsman, developed a reputation for buttonholing people to tell them about his performances during his heyday. We all know people like Herbert Sutcliffe - retired sports-people are not alone in writing their own obituaries. Effective guidance practitioners need to develop the skills to help older individuals to transform their self-written obituaries into springboards for action.


Providing transitional space

In Yorkshire there is a successful guidance organisation specialising in work with older adults, which is staffed by skilled and empathetic listeners. The staff listen carefully to individuals as they tell their stories and adopt the approach, 'Right, that’s where you were. It’s now in the past. What are you going to do in the future and what are you now going to do about it?' The approach may seem brutal, but it works. In practice the past is not forgotten. Staff work with each individual to help them identify the positive features of their stories, and how these may help them continue to make positive contributions in the future. The staff genuinely care, and the clients realise this and respond positively as a consequence. Genuine care is pivotal to the organisation’s success. The outcome statistics and feedback from clients show that the results are impressive, however these are defined.

The guidance organisation concerned – Target Third Age York – is one of a limited number of projects nationally which are providing individuals, and older individuals, with the opportunity to appraise themselves and their situation, and make considered decisions. In his opening paper, West suggests that Connexions may...

"provide a precious transitional space for highly marginalised youngsters to take stock, to question and challenge, to form new and supportive relationships, as well as value themselves and their life experience, a little more positively. Space perhaps to tell their stories, and to be listened to by committed, personally and politically conscious advisers. This may not change a world, but it may create a sense of agency and choice, however limited, perhaps for the first time in a life."

Target Third Age York, and similar initiatives such as Experience Works! in the East Midlands, are demonstrating that many individuals aged 45+ also require a 'transitional space' in order to take stock, regain confidence and self-esteem, and assess and discover what skills and qualities they can offer the community and how they wish to apply these. This in its turn means space to work through their own story with skilled and sympathetic listeners, and plan their next steps. Personal values often assume a greater importance as people age. So does the need to maximise one’s contribution through paid or unpaid work, and gain a sense of reassurance that one’s life has been worthwhile.

Many older adults experience career change in their later years for reasons that include redundancy and early retirement. The personal implications for individuals, and the decisions they have to make, can be as difficult for the older adults concerned as they are for young people in the Connexions priority groups. Older and younger age groups share a similar need for 'transitional space' to make well-considered decisions. Indeed, it is difficult to see how government can harness the skills and experience of older adults without providing more space for individuals to assess and determine how government-inspired initiatives and other opportunities fit their own personal narratives. Individuals need to be happy with their choices if they are to optimise their abilities and outputs. Forced decisions dictated by targets risk demotivation, disillusion and wastage of abilities and potential - as the Challenging Age research demonstrates.

Initiatives that offer ‘transitional space’ provide time to work through one’s own story, identify the significant features and plan ahead, but this does not necessarily mean that individuals need to do so in the context of the conventional guidance interview. Initiatives such as Target Third Age York, Experience Works! and similar community-based schemes offer adults from a diverse range of backgrounds (manual, technical, management and professional) the opportunity to take stock, explore, test themselves through paid and unpaid work experience, and (not infrequently) follow courses of learning in order to enhance employment prospects and improve personal presentation.

The most successful initiatives offer a wide range of guidance activities (Ford et al., 2003). Clients may choose to join a planned course or attend on a drop-in basis. This means that adults are able to tell and explore their story over a period of time with skilled mentors, and compare their experiences and gain support from other clients. Peer mentoring is normally a key feature of these initiatives and peer support groups occur naturally.

In her paper, Hazel Reid rightly raises the question: 'will narrative approaches be viewed as esoteric or can they connect with the day-to-day realities of guidance practice?' Reid’s concerns include both the time implications, and the extent to which narrative approaches can be reconciled with current interest in, and practice of, ‘short-cut’ guidance interventions in order to reach targets.

It may be that narrative approaches fit more easily into the longitudinal guidance process made possible within community-based initiatives that provide ‘transitional space’. The community location also ensures that narrative approaches, which tend to take place more naturally within the known community environment, automatically embrace the social, economic and political context in which people live and work, and the effect on the workplace of such factors as technological change and globalisation. Narrative-led guidance methods are no longer a theoretical concept, but are grounded in the reality of community living and in the daily interchanges and conversations between clients and helpers who have come to know and trust each other. Solutions (i.e. next steps) evolve from a continuing appraisal of personal narrative rather than being foisted on to individuals to save time and meet targets. In Reid’s words...

"an uncritical delivery of guidance intervention, focused on individual development that ignores the wider aspects of social context, power and politics, risks partial 'sticking plaster' treatments".

At the very least – and this is arguably the prime reason for the greater use of narrative-led approaches within day-to-day guidance practice – one needs to have an understanding of each individual before prescribing the treatment. As the stories grow longer with age, so the risk increases that the generalisations resulting from ‘quick fix’ guidance which are unsupported by sufficient understanding of the individuals concerned, may miss the mark because they are detached from the ‘flesh and blood’ of the actual person. There can be no personal ownership because there is no personal context within which to place any recommended actions.

The role of guidance activities in helping to 'tell the story'

Most individuals who are confronted with career change are likely to want access to a skilled listener at some stage of the transitional process, who can assist reflection, self-assessment and future planning. The Challenging Age enquiry shows just how much older adults value the skilled and experienced personal support available on a number of specialist community-based initiatives. Those providers that older people identified as being particularly helpful are all highly personalised and ‘people-focused’ initiatives that combine a number of guidance activities and learning opportunities within an integrated service (Ford et al., 2003).

During the Challenging Age consultations, participants were asked to identify the forms of help and support they required in order to overcome barriers preventing them from working and learning. Although few used the term ‘guidance’, the activities they identified are integral to high quality information, advice and guidance. They include:

> accessible, personally relevant, up-to-date and sufficiently detailed information in relation to older people: (a) to assist career choice; (b) to identify suitable local opportunities (jobs, learning, volunteering); and (c) to locate local organisations that can help;
> expert advice that helps them relate the information to their own circumstances.
> staff who are prepared to listen and have the expertise and commitment to act as 'sounding boards' and 'sources of ideas', and to help;
> staff who motivate, provide older people with hope and encouragement, and offer help and support in regaining lost confidence and self-esteem;
> staff continuity – not having to repeat one’s personal story on each visit;
> staff who offer skilled and personal support over a period of time and to whom older people can return (i.e. personal advisers and mentors). Feedback also indicates that older people welcome follow-up and ‘tracking’ of progress because these show that agencies are interested and genuinely care;
> skilled assessment – including help in identifying: existing and transferable skills, aptitudes and experience, and relating these to the current labour market; previously unrealised potential; and preferred learning styles (so that they can make optimum use of learning opportunities);
> help with such areas as personal presentation, writing CVs, interview techniques, job-search and self-advocacy – including techniques to overcome age stereotyping and hidden or overt discrimination;
> training opportunities that provide them with skills required by the local labour market, and which they can afford;
> opportunities for work trials, work sampling and work experience so that they can try out their skills, find out about unfamiliar occupations and prove themselves to employers;
> peer group support – to extend networks, provide motivation and encouragement, and support each other in achieving personal objectives.

Law, Reid, and West’s papers in Challenging Biographies, and the concluding dialogue between the three authors facilitated by Andrew Edwards, enable one to view those guidance activities identified by older adults as particularly helpful in a fresh light. Significantly, most – and arguably all - of the activities and services are those that will enable older individuals to tell, and to identify, the key features of their own personal narratives, and to begin the process of mapping out the next chapters. Older adults clearly want and welcome narrative approaches to guidance - although they are more likely to express their preferences in such terms as 'staff with time to listen', 'staff who care and are interested', 'staff who know what they are doing and can help me to work out what to do next'.

Applying narrative-based approaches within guidance

There are few mysteries involved in narrative-based guidance approaches, and even fewer mysteries in understanding why Challenging Age and similar consultation-based research projects indicate that they are likely to be welcomed by the public. People want to be listened to and respected, and have their career problems taken seriously. However, narrative-based approaches require considerable levels of skill to implement properly, and a particular combination of relatively rare qualities of sensitivity and insight in the practitioners. In her paper, Narrative and career guidance; small talk or useful dialogue?, Reid is right to focus attention on the training implications of narrative-led approaches for guidance practitioners. Active listening, and the ability to reflect back the significant features of her or his personal story to the narrator, is a highly-skilled art, which central control and emphasis on targets may have eroded.

The value for individuals of greater emphasis on narrative approaches within guidance is skilfully conveyed in Bill Law’s typically wise and profound paper, 'Guidance: too many lists, not enough stories'. By using material from published biographical writing Law provides a perceptive analysis of how individuals actually shape their lives, develop their careers, and learn from the experience of living.

It follows from Law’s timely reminder that work and career are inseparable from the rest of each individual’s progress through life, and that successful career guidance is essentially life guidance, however much the constraints imposed by time and targets may set limits on the guidance intervention. Skilled attention to individual narrative can help to ensure that guidance is offered within the context of each individual’s life, life journey and circumstances rather than circumscribed and externally dictated outcomes.

Part of Law’s thesis is that individuals are more likely to manage their careers and lives successfully if they have a deeper understanding of the processes that shape their individual stories – their relationships with other people and within their communities, the power of conversation and talk, cultural factors, apparently chance events and meetings that may prove life-shaping, and the continuing search for meaning in their lives which they share with the rest of humanity.

Law’s paper, ‘Guidance: Too many lists, not enough stories’ merits detailed study and consideration. It is ostensibly an argument for the greater use of narrative methods within guidance, and especially within careers education and guidance for younger age groups in school, college and Connexions initiatives. In practice, it is much more than this. By exploring a wide and contrasting number of narratives (mostly written by well-known writers and public figures), and by drawing out the significance of the differing ways in which the personal stories are told, Law is able to identify the key – and often life-changing – stages in each story-teller’s own learning process. These stages (or significant ‘stepping stones’) in the story-tellers’ lives are categorised for convenience as twenty ‘signposts for careers work’, and classified into five ‘story elements’. The ‘signposts’ and 'story elements’ are important because Law uses these to illuminate the actuality of much career development and decision-making, which he presents as the consequence of a series of life ‘events’ rather than dependent on outcome-driven guidance interventions without reference to the wider life context.

The case that Law is making for greater attention to the importance of personal narrative in careers work is equally applicable to other age groups, including the 45+, and so are Law’s twenty signposts to careers work. It would be possible to cite examples of the relevance of all twenty of the ‘signposts’ to guidance work with older adults. However, four examples will suffice at this stage:

> Allegiances and letting go. Many older redundant workers continue to be locked into allegiance to their previous work situation and experience difficulty in ‘letting go’.
> Roles – linking setting and person. Older women in particular may be typecast, and have typecast themselves into, roles which have come to define them as people, and may experience difficulty and guilt in understanding and dealing constructively with a growing awareness that they still have the capacity and the potential to shape new roles and extend their identities.
> Meaning as theme. Considerable numbers of older adults have embarked on new careers and new lives by recognising, and being helped to recognise, themes that repeat themselves throughout their life stories.
> Turning points and crucial questions. During the Challenging Age research project the researchers met a considerable number of older adults who had encountered turning points, and been able to ask and obtain answers to crucial questions, during the ‘transitional space’ made possible within community-based guidance initiatives. These initiatives frequently create many opportunities for meaningful experiences and encounters – through staff, peers, activities, community involvement and networks. Some of these can prove life shaping and life enhancing for the individuals involved.

Unless guidance can find ways of helping people to understand and take control of these and other personal factors that influence and shape their lives, much of the guidance available to people will continue to fall on stony ground because individuals are insufficiently empowered to take effective action. The Challenging Age research has shown that older adults, many of whom are affected by the economic changes caused by technological developments and globalisation, are particularly likely to experience feelings of disempowerment and helplessness. Law’s analysis is particularly helpful in indicating how a broader and more encompassing conception of the guidance process can help older individuals to understand what is happening to them, what may be holding them back, and how to recapture the initiative.

Issues for Challenging Biographies

There are some questions.

Old ‘DOTS’, 'NewDOTS’ and
'NewDOTSS’

For example, Law’s profound contribution to Challenging Biographies seems to me to have one major weakness. Law provides a persuasive case for the greater use of narrative approaches within careers education and guidance. However, I feel that the vehemence with which he argues the case causes him to devalue the DOTS model of careers education for which he himself is largely responsible (Law & Watts, 1977). DOTS has underpinned the vast majority of CEG programmes for over 25 years, and its formulation is one of Bill Law’s outstanding contributions to guidance, of which there have been many.

The problem lies in the enthusiastic presentation, and consequent overstatement of the case in an otherwise brilliant and sensitive paper. On first reading, many readers could be left thinking...

"We’ve based our guidance programmes and provision on DOTS and now along comes the author and says we should be doing something new – and we’re not sure how to do it, nor do we know if we have the time or resources to do so successfully."

This could leave guidance practitioners feeling deprived, uncertain - and somewhat rudderless.

A second reading of Law’s paper, however, shows that a wholesale jettisoning of DOTS is not what he is advocating...

"This is not a ‘post-DOTS’ argument, for the abandonment of past thinking; it is a ‘NewDOTS’ plea, for a much-needed extension of existing thinking".

This is a key sentence and should be italicised in the paper, because this cautionary statement is subsequently submerged in Law’s enthusiasm for the new.

The missing element is any overt consideration of what happens to ‘old DOTS’ if and as a ‘new DOTS’ evolves from the new thinking. Basically, Law’s intention is to build on what is already in place by recognising its shortcomings in the new age of flexibility and individualism, and adjusting accordingly. Law rightly identifies that DOTS is 'a means of sorting careers work provision' and that 'it does not help us to understand how careers themselves are actually managed'. Law argues that there is now a need to 'weaken... the grip of outcome-driven thinking' through the greater use of narrative methods and consequently a greater emphasis on 'the way people learn and... the way learning is shaped by attachment to group cultures'. The argument is basically for a ‘new DOTSS’, with the additional ‘S’ signifying the all-important social, cultural and personal aspects of career decision making, career management and career development. ‘New DOTSS’ provides space for the individual story, for the social being and for the process of life itself, from which career guidance can become all too easily detached – and especially so in a top-down culture dominated by prescription, direction and targets. I would suggest there is now an urgent need for a second paper which defines the kinds of programmes and provision Law is envisaging, and offers practical guidance on how to plan and implement them.

The potential value of ‘new DOTSS’ can be readily illustrated from a brief consideration of the guidance requirements of older adults, as can the proven value of ‘old DOTS’. Although ‘old DOTS’ was framed within the context of careers education and guidance in schools, its relevance to guidance work with other age groups has long been apparent. The Challenging Age research shows that many older adults require considerable help in:

> identifying and learning about suitable work and learning opportunities and the extent to which they are open to older people;
> developing their self-knowledge – for example, many older need skilled help in identifying their skills, strengths and potential and often undervalue their own abilities and experience;
> making decisions – this can be particularly difficult for individuals who have lost their self-confidence and self-esteem through redundancy and repeated rejection for reasons related, or apparently related, to age;
> negotiating transitions successfully – very few older adults have received training in career management. Job-search and self-presentation skills may have been lost through non-usage. Action planning related to career and learning may have seemed unnecessary for individuals locked into the daily routine of apparently secure work and daily living.

This is the ‘old DOTS’ agenda and remains highly relevant. However, feedback from older adults shows that they also need help in understanding their current situation – personally, culturally and politically – if they are to regain their autonomy and act independently. Many older adults feel disempowered and victimised by their circumstances. DOTS, without due attention to the additional ‘S’, may provide the structure for action, but omits any consideration of the individual factors that stimulate motivation and willpower, and enable individuals to take their story forward in positive fashion, rather than sign off at a negative and premature ending.

‘Quick-fix’ guidance

My second reservation about Challenging Biographies is the apparent lack of sympathy shown in West and Law’s papers for ‘quick-fix’ solutions, tempered though this is by Reid’s pragmatism. Reid pertinently queries whether narrative techniques may currently be 'too focused on understanding and not focused enough on action', and whether 'the approach… is… still too abstract at present'. I would suggest that this depends on the practitioner. Used successfully, as the evidence from Challenging Age suggests, attention to individual narrative may rekindle the energy required to convert information and advice into positive action.

However, time will always be a constraint for the majority of practitioners - and arguably the majority of individual clients also. Many older adults (and other age groups too) want to get on with their lives. Time begins to appears particularly short when one has passed 50. Finance and lack of it is another constraint – many people beset with mortgages and family expenditure need to earn a living.

These constraints need to be recognised in any further development of narrative techniques, if the guidance theory is to be converted into guidance practice which is widely available, and not remain the province of the few. Indeed, it is possible that story- telling may itself be subject to ‘quick fix’ approaches – or perhaps more exactly to the more efficient use of available resources.

For example, greater focus on individual narratives may not necessarily always mean that guidance workers need to allocate longer periods to listening when clients are 45+. Personal narratives continue to be told within each person’s individual consciousness, irrespective of whether there is an external audience. Many older adults may be able to do much for themselves within multi-activity guidance initiatives which enable individuals to appraise themselves and develop in self-knowledge in various situations - provided they have access to the necessary help when they require this.

For those on ‘transitional space initiatives’ this may mean short reflective periods with a personal mentor, member of the peer support group, or possibly with a trained peer mentor (Experience Works! has piloted peer mentor training to support older adults). Guidance practitioners may be able to organise guidance interviews on a sequential or ‘sandwich’ basis rather than concentrating all the available time into one interview, so that time is available for personal reflection between interventions.

Written guidance material and computer programmes might be purposely prepared to assist clients in working through their personal narratives. Indeed, some guidance resource materials can already be used in this way, although all too often time and other constraints mean that the emphasis is on rapid self-assessment rather than conscious stimulation and support of narrative approaches within a more carefully considered guidance and self-guidance context.

Guidance as part of the story

A third issue stems from the fact that, at no point in Challenging Biographies, do the authors consider the possibility that guidance interventions (including ‘quick fixes’ and DOTS-influenced careers education and guidance programmes) can themselves be seen as part of the individual’s much larger and longer story.

Skilled guidance practitioners can help individuals to view the interventions in this light, to be incorporated into the story or rejected as the individual sees fit. This should be part of the democratic process of guidance, where ownership and control remain firmly with the individual client. Problems are most likely to occur where bureaucratic pressures, including targets and financial penalties, demand that the guidance intervention should represent the end of a chapter and be accepted by clients, irrespective of their relevance and interest to the individuals concerned.

Guidance and the human condition

These reservations should not be seen as detracting from the value of the book itself, indeed rather the reverse. One of the great merits of Challenging Biographies is that it deliberately sets out to encourage debate. The excellent concluding chapter is arranged in the form of a dialogue chaired by the editor, Andrew Edwards. In his introduction to this chapter Edwards writes:

" …. the central ideas (about narrative and auto/biographical approaches) are still evolving and taking shape, and maybe still possess a certain elusive and elastic-type quality that makes their application to guidance training and practice difficult to determine. None of the writers are under any illusion about this."

The three papers that form the main part of the book, combined with the concluding dialogue, deserve to succeed in their objective of focusing attention on the potential value of narrative approaches within guidance and in generating discussion, debate and – hopefully – innovation and action.

In the conclusion to his paper, Linden West writes:

"All of us, whatever our background, have experiences of feeling lost, bewildered, confused, angry, stupid, rejected, misunderstood and redundant. ‘Globalisation’, and the uncertainties, anxieties and new possibilities this brings have the potential to unsettle us all. Each of us needs human, symbolic and imaginative resources, from time to time, to enable us to cope and revise our story and rebuild a career, in new ways. By reflecting on our own autobiographies, as professionals, and the struggles to develop our narrative repertoire, we can better connect with others engaged in the same process. Therein lies, perhaps, the ‘auto/biographical’ challenge for the guidance community: remembering the fragile but sometimes courageous humanity that we all share, when we tell our stories."

This paragraph typifies the contributions in Challenging Biographies. All the papers manifest the authors’ humanity and transparent concern for the human condition confronted by the immensity of national and international change. For the future of guidance, it is imperative that Challenging Biographies should succeed in achieving one of its objectives of helping to refocus the attention of the guidance community on each individual seeking help, and away from sole preoccupation with targets. If this happens, then the thought and commitment which have so evidently been dedicated to the production of this excellent book, will be thoroughly worthwhile. Hopefully, however, its influence will be even more extensive, and will help to concentrate attention on how narrative approaches can be incorporated more widely into guidance practice.

Conclusion

My main task has been to consider and review Challenging Biographies within the context of adult guidance, with particular reference to the feedback on guidance requirements received from the many adults, front-line guidance staff and managers interviewed during the Challenging Age research. This paper shows how closely narrative techniques meet the needs and demands of older adults. To varying degrees, a number of community-based initiatives appear to be practising narrative approaches (although not called as such), often because the workers instinctively recognise the requirement.

In the course of preparing this review I have discussed narrative-based approaches with a number of colleagues involved in third-age guidance, and the general consensus is that guidance involving older adults cannot succeed unless sufficient attention is paid to each individual’s personal narrative. Listening carefully, and helping older clients to understanding the significance of their story, are seen as fundamental to third-age guidance. This is an aspect of guidance for older adults that requires much more detailed research and development.

We owe the authors a considerable debt for refocusing our attention on the needs of the individual, at a time when the professional and client-based standards and responsibilities of guidance workers are under constant challenge. Challenging Biographies should not only be widely read – its content and messages should be widely considered, debated and - wherever possible - implemented. The book is already an important addition to the canon of guidance literature. If it succeeds in its objective of restoring individuals and their stories to their rightful place at the centre of current and future guidance practice, then its impact will be truly ground-breaking.


You are in The Career-learning Café
www.hihohiho.com

the underpinning


WHERE NOW?


A Connexions practitioner’s review of Challenging Biographies
update of Bill's chapter ‘Guidance: Too many lists, not enough stories
biographical material with career use
practical implications

References

Edwards, A (ed.), Reid, H., West, L., & Law, W. (2003).Challenging Biographies: relocating the theory and practice of careers work: implications of narrative perspectives for third age. Canterbury: Canterbury Christ Church University College.

Ford, G., Watkins, B., Bosley, S., Hawthorn, R., McGowan, B., & Grattan, P. (2003). Challenging Age: Information, Advice and Guidance for Older Age Groups. Sheffield: Department for Education and Skills.
Law, B., & Watts, A.G., (1977). Schools, Careers and Community. London: Church Information Office.