Map of self-perceived growth for reviewing user journey and negotiating career transitions

Background: There exist very few participatory research tools to facilitate youth to review and archive their user journey in a systematic manner for negotiating their career transitions.

Objective: The purpose of this study was to examine in what way the map of self-perceived growth (MSPG) was used as an effective participatory research tool for reviewing and archiving the user journey of marginalised youth for negotiating their career transitions and for drawing implications for career interventions and research.

Method: The MSPG template was used for conducting individual interviews with ex-users for mapping out their user journey with the use of nine emoji icons and a 10-point Likert-type scale. A thematic qualitative analysis was applied to study three sampled sets of transcripts and participant-constructed maps.

Results: The youth participants were able to map out their user journey with departure point, turning points and future career aspirations. The participant-constructed maps can visualise both psychological ownership and work volition and the use of psychosocial resources available from an enabling environment, which were found helpful for strengthening the agency of youth in negotiating career transitions, and showing embedded career interventions for drawing implications for both career interventions and research studies.

Conclusion: The study result suggests using the MSPG for reviewing and archiving user experience and articulating youth’s career aspirations, which can help inform youth’s negotiating career transitions. Further research studies on using the map template and the participant-constructed maps for strengthening agentic negotiations and career interventions are recommended.