After completing upper secondary vocational education, graduates face one of the most challenging career tasks: transitioning to tertiary education or the labor market. However, vocational programs are not academically oriented, and vocational students are usually trained to perform specific jobs. Thus, vocational skill-based tracks qualify students to enter the labor market, limiting their access to tertiary education in many countries (see OECD, 2020, Figure B7.2, for more details). Besides, in countries with school-based vocational education, graduates have a higher risk of unemployment and unskilled employment compared to general-education graduates (Cedefop, 2018). As such, vocational graduates need skills enabling them to adapt to changing career contexts.

Research suggests that career adaptability increases the chance of mastering career transitions because career adaptability can promote a successful transition adaptation with positive effects on both career and life outcomes, such as vocational identity clarity and increased life satisfaction (Savickas, 2013; Savickas & Porfeli, 2012; Rudolph et al., 2017). Vocational identity clarity and life satisfaction are important indicators of successful career adaptation (Rudolph et al., 2017). Career adaptability should facilitate the development of a clear vocational identity that enables the implementation of individual vocational self-concepts in occupational roles and helps create meaning in careers (Savickas, 2013). Moreover, successful engagement with vocational challenges is regarded as a core developmental task in young adulthood and a major source of meaning in life (e.g., Skorikov & Vondracek, 2011); as such, career adaptability has been linked with general life satisfaction (Santilli et al., 2017).

According to the career construction model of adaptation (Rudolph et al., 2017; Savickas, 2013; Savickas & Porfeli, 2012), the associations between career adaptability and adaptation outcomes (such as vocational identity clarity and life satisfaction) are partially mediated by adaptive responses. Among various adaptive responses, self-efficacy beliefs are presumed to be a key factor in career adaptation processes (Hirschi et al., 2015). Specifically, career decision-making self-efficacy is particularly relevant for career preparation, entry, adjustments, and changes across career paths, because it captures individuals’ confidence in using the necessary strategies for successfully navigating a career decision-making process (Hirschi et al., 2015; Lent & Brown, 2013).

This paper is intended to contribute to the existing literature in several ways. First, we examined the longitudinal relationships between career adaptability and both career and life adaptation outcomes (Rudolph et al., 2017). Second, this is the first study to integrate career decision-making self-efficacy as a mediator of the relationships between career adaptability and adaptation outcomes. Third, we investigated a sample of vocational graduates in an actual career transition. Thus, this study empirically tests the career construction model of adaptation (Rudolph et al., 2017; Savickas, 2013; Savickas & Porfeli, 2012) and contributes to a better understanding of the process by which career adaptability leads to successful adaptation over time. Moreover, investigating vocational graduates in an actual career transition can provide practical implications to help vocational students navigating career challenges and transitions.

Participants and Procedure We conducted a three-wave longitudinal study among a large and diverse group of Czech vocational graduates from a wide range of fields. The first wave of the data collection took place in March and April 2018, approximately 2–3 months before students graduated from vocational school (T1). At T1, 3,126 students completed the survey. The second wave of data collection took place in February and March 2019, approximately ten months from the first measurement point (T2). At T2, 512 participants completed the survey (response rate 16.4%). In the third wave, the data collection took place in December 2019 and January 2020, about twenty months after the first measurement point (T3). The questionnaires were returned by 328 participants, accounting for 63.2% of participants who completed the survey at T2 (total response rate of 10.5%). Attrition analyses showed that participants who participated in two consecutive measurements did not differ in any measured variables from those who took part only in the first wave (ds < 0.10). Measures Career adaptability was assessed using the Czech form of the Career Adapt-Abilities Scale (CAAS-Czech; Hlaďo et al., 2020). Vocational identity clarity was measured using the Czech version of the Vocational Identity Scale (VIS; Jörin et al., 2003). Life satisfaction was measured with the Czech adaptation (Blatný et al., 2004) of the Satisfaction with Life Scale. Career decision-making self-efficacy. We used the Czech version of the Career Decision Self-Efficacy Scale–Short Form (CDMSE-SF; Kvasková & Almenara, 2019). In the present study, the McDonald’s ω internal consistency estimate was between .84 to .94, indicating good to excellent reliability of the instruments used. Stastical Analysis We tested a structural model where career adaptability at T1 predicts career decision-making self-efficacy at T2, which, in turn, predicts vocational identity clarity and life satisfaction at T3. In addition, we assessed the direct effects of career adaptability at T1 on the two adaption outcomes (i.e., vocational identity clarity and life satisfaction) at T3. To assess change in the outcome variables over time, we controlled for their respective levels at T1 for career decision-making self-efficacy and vocational identity clarity and at T2 for life satisfaction. The model showed adequate fit to the data, χ2(16) = 125.7, p < .001, RMSEA = .050 (90% CI = .042–.059), TLI = .889, SRMR = .087.

Our findings showed that career adaptability resources during vocational school positively predicted adaptive responses, which in turn positively related to adaptation outcomes after the transition. Specifically, our findings showed that career decision-making self-efficacy fully mediated the association between career adaptability and vocational identity. However, our study did not show long-term positive effects of career adaptability on life satisfaction. Accordingly, we can conclude that during a career transitional period, supported by career adaptability, career decision-making self-efficacy contributes to forming a clear and stable vocational identity. As stuch, our study provided mixed support for the career construction model of adaptation (Rudolph et al., 2017; Savickas, 2013; Savickas & Porfeli, 2012). Our paper provided empirical support for the beneficial effect of a higher level of career adaptability in vocational graduates before their graduation on their successful career adaptation after graduation. This result makes a strong case for implementing the assessment and training of career adaptability resources into career counseling for vocational students, especially before their career transition period. It could be beneficial to measure individuals’ adaptability resources and identify the need to design appropriate interventions to promote them. As suggested by Savickas (2013) and further supported by Koen et al. (2012), career adaptability resources can be strengthened through training interventions. In this line of thinking, it would be useful to design training in various career adaptability activities, such as exploring possible career selves and career options, making plans and decisions to pursue chosen career options, and developing tactics to overcome possible career obstacles to promote career adaptability resources.

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