My default instincts as a practitioner were to avoid asking questions about individual family backgrounds in standard advisory interactions; this was borne out a desire to avoid assumptions about what, if any, family individuals might have. Therefore, when I conducted research as part of my PhD into graduate transitions I wanted to use the opportunity to discover more about the role of family, something that I had only ever skirted around as a careers adviser. My questions in research interviews addressed how graduates viewed the role of family in influencing and supporting them as they started out in their careers. I wanted to find out more about how graduates made sense of their social connections as I had become increasingly aware of inequity in the graduate labour market and how socio-economic backgrounds contributed to this.  As I had read and observed so much about differential social capital based on social class, I was particularly interested to uncover the details of ordinary working class lives.

In my research, I was really struck by the important role of families in providing support. This could be in a variety of ways – not least as economic and emotional safety nets. Social support from family emerged across all interview participants (n20) in my study although manifest in different ways. In particular, my findings led me to question default depictions of working class graduates, which tend to emphasise what they lack compared to their more advantaged peers.  I do not argue for an idealised presentation of working class families or seek to gloss over structural inequalities in the labour market,  but instead I argue for a greater  recognition of how those who do not have the benefits of an advantaged background can also be insulated by their families. I have written about this in more detail with Ciaran Burke in a recent article for the British Educational Research Journal.   

In my PhD, I explored ‘uncertain’ graduate transitions into the labour market and individuals who found it difficult to find a firm footing as they started their working lives.  Many of my participants were first generation university students and did not come from advantaged social backgrounds.  Findings evoked the enabling but also limiting role of family. I used a social theory (not used in mainstream careers research) to illuminate issues of identity. In our article, Stories of Family in Working Class Graduates Early Careers  (Christie & Burke, 2021)  we borrow the word ‘salience’ from the work of Dorothy Holland and her co-authors (1998) and ‘distinction’ from Pierre Bourdieu (1984), to capture the different depictions of family.  Both articulations of ‘salience’ and a search for ‘distinction’ emerged in how graduates’ stories responded to family.

Most immediate responses from research participants would be to dismiss the role that family had in influencing career decisions and that their career was a sole authored journey. However, follow up questions often revealed the slippery nature of these claims of independence. Examples of ‘salience’ included the important role of siblings but also of mothers’ late return to education. There were also some expressions of solidarity with a working class background and a rejection of an aspirations-deficit  discourse.  In contrast, some graduates did more clearly seek to be distinct from their families, which fits with a classic Bourdieusian analysis in which an uncomfortable separation occurs as working class people are ‘a fish out of water’ in more professional contexts and appear to need to dissociate from family, in order to move into a different world that seems remote from their background.

I would argue that there are implications for careers educators and practitioners to foster student reflexivity about family sensitively, and to be aware of how family backgrounds may influence graduate career paths and students’ awareness of wider inequalities. I do not propose that careers practitioners start asking intrusive questions about individual backgrounds. However, sensitivity to different backgrounds is important to appreciate the varied resources that individuals bring to their hoped for career. It is valuable to encourage individuals to consider what they do have in terms of networks and social support rather than focusing just on what they may lack. We need to change the discourse of networking, which is narrowly focussed on useful social connections and social capital, and creatively find ways to appreciate diverse resources. In the public eye, Marcus Rashford is a great example of someone whose successful campaigning for Free School Meals for schoolchildren has been grounded in his own socio-economic background. He received Free School Meals as a child and his family used food banks when he was growing up. His story resonates of the classic rags to riches tale, but in his case, he draws positively on his background rather than implying that his success as a Manchester United footballer was in spite of where he comes from.

The role of family has come into sharper focus due to Covid-19. On a daily basis, we hear stories of families thrown into greater dependence, whether it be for home-schooling or care of the vulnerable. For some family relationships can be toxic, while for others they provide invaluable anchorage. Careers practitioners can be alert to such differences and be sensitive to the diversity of what family can represent for individuals.

References

Bourdieu, P. (1984). Distinction : a social critique of the judgement of taste. London: London : Routledge & Kegan Paul.

Christie, F., & Burke, C. (2021). Stories of family in working-class graduates’ early careers. British Educational Research Journal. doi:https://doi.org/10.1002/berj.3689

Holland, D., Lachicotte, W., Skinner, D., & Cain, C. (1998). Identity and agency in cultural worlds. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press.