Figure Piloting Innovation: Integrating the Career Adapt-Abilities Scale-UK into Practice

Abstract

Implementation of new theories that are rigorous and research-based into practice is challenging. It requires a willingness to take risks, both on the part of the individual practitioner, but also the employing organization. Funding mechanisms that reward a focus on placement into sustainable employment can operate as powerful inhibitors of innovatory practices that focus on holistic approaches to professional practice. The Career Adapt-Ability Scale International (CAAS-I), a scale developed to integrate vocational psychology with constructivist approaches is one such example of a theoretically informed innovation currently available. Here, validation and implementation of the scale adapted for the UK context into higher education, then a professional association are discussed, together with lessons learned regarding the implementation of innovatory practice.