CAREER OPPORTUNITIES AND THEIR INTERFACES: EXPERIENCES OF HEALTHCARE SPECIALISTS

Abstract

The paper analyses health professionals' experiences of fulfilment and career paths, arguing for their interrelationships. Analysis of key findings from a qualitative study revealed that: health professionals' experiences of career self-realisation are diverse, conditioned by their competences, goals, desires, opportunities, enabling conditions, and abilities to know themselves and their career options, to make their own career decisions, to plan and realise their careers, and to take responsibility for their personally managed career process; healthcare professionals are provided with both horizontal and vertical career opportunities, meeting both personal and organisational career needs; healthcare professionals prioritise horizontal career paths, learning and development experiences, internal comfort, positive emotionality, satisfaction with activities, discovering meaning, and the harmonisation of career and other areas of their lives. The theoretical approaches and the qualitative research carried out confirmed the validity of the links between self-fulfilment and career: Career and self-fulfilment is a lifelong development process involving attitudes, skills, abilities, values, personality traits; the holistic expression of career and self-fulfilment creates meaning and fulfillment in work, increases self-esteem and self-confidence, provides emotional and pragmatic satisfaction, motivates performance and quality, and ensures continuity of successful career opportunities for health professionals.