Career shocks are significant disruptive events, usually outside an individual’s control, that force individuals to reflect on their careers. Although these events arise from the context, little attention has been paid to the characteristics of this context and how it can affect a career shock and its consequences. The aim of this paper is to bring context to the forefront in the analysis of career shocks and analyse its impact by comparing those working in extreme and non-extreme contexts. We define extreme contexts as those where work can, directly or indirectly, act as a threat to health and safety or even to life. We present a qualitative study collecting career histories and incorporating critical incidents with 39 individuals who report that they have experienced career shocks. We use a constructivist grounded approach to analyse the process that can follow a shock that often proceeds from shock to reflection to behaviour. This study contributes to the existing literature in two ways: exploring the role of context in experiencing career shocks, and unpacking the processual aspect of career shock experiences.
