Mind the Setback! Enacted sensemaking in young workers’ early career transitions

Setbacks at career transitions can have an enduring impact on how people enact their subsequent careers. Drawing on an enacted sensemaking perspective, we examine the micro-mechanisms of career choice and navigation with and without a setback experience. Empirically, we conducted 42 interviews with Austrian apprentices and compared their career transitions and subsequent navigation through abductive analysis. We found that the apprentices overcoming setbacks at the outset of their careers engaged in more deliberate sensemaking, leading them to aspirations and expectations associated with thriving and career growth. Conceptually, we present a model of enacted sensemaking during career transitions, showing how the expectations and aspirations people enact lead to different kinds of possibilities within their career space. Contributing to career setback and sensemaking literature, we further show how deliberate sensemaking continues to shape individuals? awareness of possibility beyond the setback experience.