“Crafting your own success”: a time-lagged study on the mediating role of job crafting dimensions in the relationship between protean career and career success

Purpose: As the notions of protean career and job crafting share a common emphasis on self-management, proactivity and customization, this study aimed to examine if the associations between protean career, subjective and objective career success were mediated by job crafting, assessed via its three main dimensions (i.e. increasing structural job resources, increasing social job resources and increasing challenging job demands). Design/methodology/approach: The authors sampled 594 Italian employees using a time-lagged research design: protean career was assessed at T1 and job crafting and career success at T2. Responses were analyzed through structural equation modeling. Findings: This study’s results showed that increasing structural job resources mediated the association of protean career with subjective career success, while increasing challenging job demands mediated its association with objective career success. Originality/value: In contrast to previous studies, in this contribution, the mediating role of job crafting is disentangled by taking into account its three respective dimensions. Additionally, the authors included both forms of career success as outcomes of protean career. Implications for future research and practical recommendations are presented and discussed.