Stories of Calling: How Called Professionals Construct Narrative Identities

Abstract

Experiencing work as a calling has been described as the ideal of a truly positive experience of work. But what we know about how called professionals construct identities as people who are called to their work is incomplete. Discussions about callings are often framed as narratives—stories of people’s callings—yet little is known about how professionals incorporate a wide variety of life events into coherent stories that support their identity claims. To understand this process, we analyzed the narratives of 236 individuals from four professions. We found two ways our participants identified their callings: discernment and exploration. Discerners journeyed toward their destiny, which was their one true calling. Explorers actively searched for work they loved, but destiny played no role. Through a series of lived experiences, called professionals’ identities took shape as they were enacted, with their callings strengthening over time. After identifying their calling, each of these professionals engaged in two crucial processes for integrating self and work as they lived their calling. Like other professionals, called professionals sought legitimacy in their fields by demonstrating mastery and receiving affirmation. Yet their sense of calling simultaneously propelled them to craft personal authenticity through tailoring their own unique enactment of the role.

Managing Leader Identity at Work: A Practice-Oriented Approach

“…Also, leader identity is further strengthened when the narrative is motivating and meaningful to the leader. The leader identity management process helps leaders develop, document, and articulate their leadership narrative as a story which often becomes a key element of their leader identity (Bloom et al, 2020;Ibarra & Barbulescu, 2010;McAdams, 2013). A leader's unique narrative and the development of a story helps leaders integrate key life experiences, events and people influences into their leader identity.…”

“…Importantly, leaders construct narratives when recalling significantly impactful situations. These personalized recollections retrieved from their autobiographical memories often become important elements of their leader identity and leadership story (Bloom, 2020;Habermas & Kober, 2015;Kerns, 2018a;McLean et al, 2020). • Having leaders identify, prioritize and focus on a set of core and complementary leader identity factors, as part of their broader unique leader profile, has brought additional clarity and impact to the process of managing leader identity (Kerns, 2020a;Kerns, 2021a).…”

“…The self-views of leaders that relate to leadership can be identified, organized and put into narrative form to help leaders clarify their identity as a leader. A leader's unique narrative can then be woven into a leadership story and communicated for high-impact to stakeholders as needed and appropriate (Bloom et al, 2020;Zheng et al, 2020). A leader's self-views, unique narrative and leadership story become key elements in the managing leader identity at work process.…”

“…This outcome helps strengthen their leader identity while helping to enhance their well-being as leaders. Typically, in my work with leaders it has proven valuable to have them develop and deliver a clear coherent leadership story that they find motivating and meaningful (Bloom et al, 2020). This is often an indicator of the strength of their leader identity.…”

The Irony of Accountability: How a Performance-Inducing Policy Reduces Motivation to Perform

“…Organizations have been instituting wellness programs, flexible policies, corporate counseling services, and other programs aimed at improving people's psychological and mental health (Ryan et al 2021;Kirk and Brown 2003). Organizational studies have also been more interested in topics such as meaningful work, "calling" identities, and flexible work structures that affect subjective wellbeing (Bloom, Colbert, and Nielsen 2020;Bunderson and Thompson 2009;Gonsalves 2020).…”