Career motives according to degree of religiosity among Jewish students in Israel

ABSTRACT

Members of Israel’s Jewish population self-identify along religious lines as ultra-orthodox, religious, traditional, or secular. Adherents of each group maintain different lifestyles and different social, political and economic values. This unique study attempts to reveal the differing intra-state career motives among these sub-groups. The global research project GUESSS (Global University Entrepreneurial Students‘ Spirit Survey) included 995 Israeli students, who were asked about their career motives. The findings reveal that there is a very high similarity between ultra-orthodox and religious on one hand and between traditional and secular on the other hand, regarding career motives. Ultra-orthodox and religious had a significantly lower motive for autonomy and control, for a stimulating job and for realizing dreams and creativity than traditional and secular. Gender and age do not affect the motives, while military service and family status have a significant effect on the motive for autonomy and control.

KEYWORDS:

• Career motives
• work values
• religiosity degree
• ultra-orthodox
• Jews
• Israel

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1. Torah in its narrowest definition refers to the bible, or even more specifically to the five books of Moses. Generally though, the term Torah refers to the corpus of Jewish religious scholarship in its entirety from the bible and its commentaries, through the Talmud of the early middle ages, all the way through to modern religious-themed literature.

2. Literally the head of the yeshiva, or religious seminary. While the position may be comparable to a university president, the holder of the position is an authority on Halacha, Jewish religious law, and has a major impact on the day-to-day decision-making of his adherents.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Moshe Sharabi

Moshe Sharabi earned his PhD at the University of Haifa; he is an associate professor at the Sociology and Anthropology Department and the head of MA studies in Organizational Developing and Consulting, Yezreel Valley Academic College. He is also a researcher at the Center for the Study of Organizations and Human Resource Management in the University of Haifa. His current research interests include human resource management, organizational leadership, cross sectional and cross-cultural comparative research on work values. His studies have been published in varied academic journals including International Labour Review, International Journal of Psychology, Cross Cultural Management, Employee Relations and Sociological Perspectives.

Brian A Polin

Brian A Polin is a senior lecturer in the School of Management at the Jerusalem College of Technology.  He holds a PhD in strategy and international business from Kent State University.  His research interests include entrepreneurship and the values and motivations that propel one to become an entrepreneur, as well as cross-cultural and cross-country studies of attitudes and business performance.  His research has appeared in diverse academic journals including Armed Forces and Society, International Journal of Intercultural Relations and Employee Relations.