I came across another fascinating piece that relates story to career, in this case the careers of women. Teresa J. Carter conducted a heuristic study in which she was co-researcher with 10 women. She interviewed them and also had them keep journals. Here’s the reference followed by the story-related excerpt:
Carter, T. J. (2002). The importance of talk to midcareer women’s development: A collaborative inquiry. The Journal of Business Communication, 39(1), p. 55+.
Telling their stories to me in narrative format through our conversations and through their journal entries became the means of re-framing identities and gaining self-understanding.
Linde (1990) asserts that narrative encourages development of a private, internal sense of self, as well as the self that is expressed and conveyed to others. She believes that this derives from the sense of reflexivity involved in narrative: the ability to reflect upon the self that occurs when the act of narration creates a split between the narrator and the protagonist of the story. As women observed themselves as protagonists in their own stories, they became critically self-reflective of their learning. These same journaling techniques and e-mail dialogues can be used as learning strategies by managers and women interested in self-development or by adult educators and trainers to help facilitate self-discovery in collaboration with others. Caffarella (1996) describes many such teaching techniques (e.g., reflective journal writing, self-disclosure, use of literature and poetry, storytelling, and reflective group exercises) for staff development that allow participants’ feelings to be a part of the learni ng activity. Women in this study described experiences of this nature that were integral to transformative learning.