Local worker perspectives from Nicaraguan surf tourism: revisiting career anchors in non-standard work contexts

What is it about?

The careers of workers from non-standard contexts hold interest for career theory and for better understanding workers from the global South, where more commonly-studied white-collar expatriate managers often live. This study examines the internal careers of surf workers in Nicaragua through the lens of Career Anchor theory and expands on its applications to nontraditional workers and work contexts.

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Photo by Louis Hansel on Unsplash

Photo by Louis Hansel on Unsplash

Why is it important?

The results indicate the sustained value and instrumentality of Schein's original career anchor theory, specifically in terms of the interconnectedness of dominant and supporting anchors and the relevance of anchor groupings for workers in non-standard working environments. The anchors of lifestyle, entrepreneurial creativity, and security and stability were closely interrelated and complementary, as participants from this context were ultimately striving for security and stability. Future research should consider more explicitly the role of the socio-political, environmental or economic context in shaping the internal career self-concepts and experiences of workers. Non-standard work contexts and local worker voices are both thematically underrepresented in the careers scholarship. Research on these topics can contribute to broader discussions of sustainability, sustainable development goals and decolonial perspectives in social science scholarship. Bringing local workers from the Global South into view means turning scholarly attention towards less-visible “others” working alongside those having received the lion's share of academic discussion, i.e. expatriate workers on a global assignment or self-initiated expatriates, most often from the Global North.