‘It’s difficult to forecast your longer term career milestone’: career development and insecure employment for research academics in Australian universities

ABSTRACT

Universities globally have undergone significant changes in the past three decades and Australia is no exception. The importance to universities of research has resulted in a surge in the employment of research focused academics in Australian universities. Findings from the 2011 Work and Careers in Australian Universities (WCAU) survey revealed 84% of research academics were employed on fixed-term contracts. To explore the impact of insecure employment for research academics we used the labour market segmentation literature to determine whether these academics constitute a ‘secondary’ labour force. Interviews with 18 research academics revealed insecure employment had negatively affected their career development. Responses indicated that it affected particularly their ability to publish productively, develop an independent research profile and form networks and collaborative connections. Insecure employment has a largely negative impact on research academics’ careers and as a result they have become a ‘secondary’ labour force in universities.

KEYWORDS:

• Fixed-term employment
• insecure employment
• labour market segmentation
• research academics
• universities

Acknowledgements

Thanks to Dr Carolyn Troup for the preparation of the statistical data. Funding was granted by the ARC LP 0991191. The authors acknowledge that they do not have any financial interest and will not receive any benefit arising from the application of this research. The views expressed herein are those of the authors and are not necessarily those of the Australian Research Council.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1. There are some researchers classified as general staff. In this article, we focus on analysing only those classified as academics.

2. Universities in Australia are divided into four categories: Group of Eight (Go8) universities, Australian Technology Network (ATN), Innovative Research Universities (IRU) and Regional Universities Network.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Australian Research Council [LP0991191].

Notes on contributors

Kaye Broadbent

Kaye Broadbent is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Employment Relations and Human Resources, Griffith University. She has been an Australia Research Council Postdoctoral Fellow and a Federal Government Endeavour Award recipient. She has published widely in the areas of gender and insecure work in Japan, women, work and unions in Japan and Korea, care work in Japan and gender equity in Australian universities. Her publications include Women’s Employment in Japan: The Experience of Part-time Workers (2003) and a co-edited volume Women and Labour Organizing in Asia: Diversity, Autonomy and Activism (2008). She is currently co-editing a volume with Glenda Strachan and Geraldine Healy on gender and the professions. Her current research interests focus on insecure employment and career development in Australian and British universities and labour resistance in Japan during WW2.

Glenda Strachan

Glenda Strachan is Emeritus Professor in the Department of Employment Relations and Human Resources, Griffith University, Australia. Her research focuses on women and work, in both a contemporary and historical setting, and especially on the impact of national and organisational policies. She was first Chief Investigator on the recent Australian Research Council Linkage Grant, Gender and Employment Equity: Strategies for Advancement in Australian Universities. She is author and editor (with French and Burgess) of Managing Diversity in Australia: Theory and Practice, and numerous articles and book chapters.