CAREER MANAGMENT IN BUSINESS - Essay Example

It attempts to show the dynamic relationships and how it can evolve over the period of time between the parties to the contract. This essay will attempt to explore the changes that are said to be taking place in the psychological contract between the employer and the employee and what potential implication it can have for a person's career and career management strategies. It is argued that the term psychological contract is in use since 1960s however its actual significance came when the general economic downturn in the economy was witnessed during early 1990s.

The term psychological contract has been defined as" the perceptions of the two parties, employee and employer, of what their mutual obligations are towards each other" (GUEST&CONWAY). It is argued that there is a very subtle difference between the legal contract as well as psychological contract as the legal contract seem to depict only a one side of the employment relationship between the employer and the employee whereas psychological contract attempt to fill that gap by broadening the scope of the same.

During the process of hiring an employee, both the parties i.e. . It is very important to note that the quality of organisational life of an employee largely depend upon the way the psychological contract between both the parties has been shaped because the expectations of both the parties to the contract give rise to certain mutual obligations on the part of both the parties and it becomes an implied responsibility of both the parties to fulfill their psychological contractual obligations as psychological contract attempt to look at the reality in much broader way as compared to the legal contract.

It is also believed that the success of psychological contract between both the parties to the contract largely depend upon the way both the parties show fairness to each other as well as how they develop trust and belief in each other. Since the psychological contract is based on the idea of informal and unwritten contract therefore the softer side of human resource management i.e. the soft skills associated with management takes a leading role in defining the effective psychological contract between the employer and the employee.

Changes taking placeIn order to assess the changes taking place in psychological contract between the employer and the employee, it is very important to understand as to how the modern practices of working have evolved. With the advent of industrial revolution, the working relationship between the employer and the employee were not considered as cordial and good and it was because of this reason that the unions emerged. However as the workforce became more feminized and more educated with better awareness of the legal obligations of employer as well as employee, these