Setting Out Unwillingly: A Qualitative Analysis of the ‘Career Drift’ Experience Through Social Media Narratives
Öz
This study examines the increasingly visible phenomenon of "career drift" in the context of 21st-century work life, characterized by uncertainty, fragility, and flexibility, through the lens of social media narratives. Employing a qualitative research design, the study analyzed 120 publicly available posts collected from Twitter (now X) and Ekşi Sözlük using purposive sampling. Thematic analysis revealed five key themes: externally driven career orientation, occupational meaninglessness and identity ambiguity, permanence of temporary solutions, digital lamentation and narrative coping, and reorientation and deferred future construction. The findings reveal that users often make career choices based on coincidences, economic constraints, or environmental pressures, and experience significant ruptures in terms of meaning, identity, and belonging in these decisions. It was also observed that individuals express these experiences on social media through humor, irony, and a critical tone, using these platforms as a form of emotional coping. The study emphasizes the need to conceptualize career drift within a distinct theoretical framework and offers structural recommendations for career counseling practices and vocational guidance services.
Anahtar Kelimeler
Career drift, life narrative, digital narratives, career counseling
Etik Beyan
Statement on Ethics Committee Approval
The study entitled “Setting Out Unintentionally: A Qualitative Analysis of the 'Career Drift' Experience Through Social Media Narratives” is based on the analysis of content voluntarily shared by users on publicly accessible social media platforms (e.g., Twitter/X, Ekşi Sözlük). No direct interviews were conducted with individuals, no personal data were collected, and no identifying information was disclosed.
In this context, the principles of personal data protection and research ethics were meticulously observed, and only anonymous and public data were utilized. When analyzing participants’ posts, personally identifiable elements were removed, and the principle of confidentiality was upheld with the utmost care.
Therefore, in line with the announcement titled “On Ethics Committee Approval in Social Sciences and Humanities” published by the Council of Higher Education (YÖK) in 2020, this study falls within the scope of research that does not require ethics committee approval.
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