A comparison of white-collar career development in the UK, Germany and Japan : An empirical analysis focusing on managerial positions at large companies

To clarify the commonalities and differences in career development among the three countries by analyzing the survey data (hereinafter abbreviated as 2021 English-German-Japanese survey) conducted by the author for white-collar workers in the United Kingdom, Germany and Japan. This is the aim of this article. As a result of data analysis, the following was clarified. First, many managers in the UK have changed jobs after being hired mid-career. On the other hand, Japanese managers have a large proportion of new graduates hired and internally promoted. Germany is in the middle. Second, Germany has the strongest vocational significance (professional relevance) of education in the sense that what it learns at school is useful for the current job, followed by the United Kingdom and the weakest in Japan. Third, the degree to which the acquisition of public vocational qualifications is useful for career advancement and promotion is high in Germany and the United Kingdom, and low in Japan. Fourth, horizontal career within the organization, that is, the range of work experience, managers in Germany and the United Kingdom are more likely to specialize in specific functions, but in Japan the range of careers is wide. Fifth, the time for vertical or promotion selection of careers within the organization was early in the UK and late in Japan. Germany was in the middle. Seventh, there is a possibility that the elements of autonomous career consciousness emphasized by new career theories such as boundaryless careers and protean careers are more common in the United Kingdom and Germany than in Japan. In addition, as a result of cluster classification of career views, it was found that there are clusters with high autonomous career awareness in each country, and that performance is related to them. Based on the above, the characteristics of the three countries are based on the main points of this paper ,which wre ratio of people who have changed jobs, relationship between work and education, range of work experience), promotion selection time, and autonomous career awareness as a career view. The following is a brief summary. White-collar workers in Japan can be characterized by long-term career development based on a wide range of work experience and slow promotion at a specific company under a weak link between work and education, and low autonomous career awareness. On the other hand, in the UK, white-collar workers with a high level of autonomous career awareness will be promoted to managerial positions while experiencing multiple companies. In addition, Germany could be characterized by forming a career tailored to a particular profession with a strong link between work and education. And it can be said that this is almost consistent with the desirable career course drawn by the white-collar workers of Britain, Germany and Japan.