Received 08/26/12

Revised 12/13/12
Accepted 01/01/13
DOI: 10.1002/j.2161-0045.2014.00070.x

A Moderated Mediation Model of

Planned Happenstance Skills,
Career Engagement, Career Decision
Self-Efficacy, and
Career Decision Certainty
Boram Kim, Sun Hee Jang, Sun Hwa Jung,
Bo Hyun Lee, Ana Puig, and Sang Min Lee
This study examined how college students’ levels of planned happenstance skills
influenced the relationships among career engagement, career decision self-efficacy,
and career decision certainty. Moderated mediation analysis was used with a sample
of 217 Korean undergraduate students. The results indicated that career decision
self-efficacy mediated the relationship between career engagement and career
decision certainty. Moreover, the positive indirect effect of career engagement on
career decision through career decision self-efficacy was strengthened as the level
of planned happenstance skills increased. In conclusion, college students’ career
engagement strengthens their career decision certainty via career decision self-
efficacy when they have enough planned happenstance skills to discover unexpected
career opportunities.

Keywords: planned happenstance skills, career decision self-efficacy, career decision

certainty, career engagement, moderated mediation model

For college students, searching for a job or exploring careers is one of

the most important life tasks. During this period, most college students
explore their interests and aptitudes to decide their future career and,
furthermore, to find a satisfying job. After this stage, making time to
consider life-changing career activities becomes more difficult. There-
fore, college students, especially juniors and seniors, invest most of their
time on career development activities such as internship experiences.
Determining one’s future career is perceived as a big challenge to almost
every college student.
Several theories have been developed to help understand and explain
the career decision-making process, a matter of great importance for
college students. Self-efficacy theory (SET; Bandura, 1977), in particular,
has received extensive attention in the career literature (Betz & Hackett,
2006). Self-efficacy refers to the self-trust that one is able to perform a
task successfully. This concept is related to a person’s perception of their

Boram Kim, Sun Hee Jang, Sun Hwa Jung, Bo Hyun Lee, and Sang Min Lee,
Department of Education, Korea University, Seoul, South Korea; Ana Puig, Of-
fice of Educational Research, University of Florida. This work was supported by a
grant (NRF-2011-330-B00167) from the National Research Foundation of Ko-
rea. Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Sang Min Lee,
Department of Education, Korea University, Anam-Dong, Seongbuk-Gu, Seoul,
South Korea (e-mail: leesang@korea.ac.kr).
© 2014 by the National Career Development Association. All rights reserved.

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 ability to reach a specific goal, and also to their expectation that they
can master a situation and produce a positive outcome. In this sense,
SET postulates that self-efficacy is developed from mastery experiences
in which goals are achieved through perseverance and overcoming
obstacles and from observing others succeed through sustained effort.
Thus, self-efficacy is considered as a crucial concept in positive psychol-
ogy, and SET is widely applied to the study of academic performance
and also to the career decision process.
It is important for career counselors to concentrate their clients’ ef-
forts on the career-searching process and strive to find out what their
career goals are. Cox, Rasmussen, and Conrad (2007) asserted that
individuals who are engaged are more prepared for and adaptable in
the ever-changing world of work and are also more satisfied and ful-
filled in their careers. Occupational engagement interventions include
activities ranging from participating in a career camp to seeking career
counseling services.
Particularly, one of the objectives of career counseling services is to
facilitate the clients’ career search activities and to help them make ap-
propriate career decisions. Clients are encouraged to engage in multiple
activities related to careers or to explore career choices (O’Brien et al.,
2000). Clients’ involvement in career search activities enhances their
self-trust and confidence that they can make a good career decision; this
in turn leads to increased career decision certainty. Supporting self- and
career-exploration activities has been a major aspect of career counseling
interventions (Zunker, 2001). Although some clients decide their career
through these traditional career counseling approaches, others may not
benefit from this traditional approach. At times, clients may feel lost in
a world of uncertainty and feel that there should be something more
than rational reasoning in choosing their future career.
Some people transform happenstance events into an opportunity for
learning whereas others gain nothing. According to Lent, Brown, and
Hackett (1994), exposure to new experiences plays a significant role
because it is the first stage to boost the career development process. To
find their career interest and aptitude, individuals need to be adventur-
ous and somewhat risk taking in early adulthood (Atkinson & Murrell,
1988; Pryor & Bright, 2009). Many college students have a difficult
time finding out about careers they might find interesting. This may
be because of a lack of initial encounters with new experiences. Hap-
penstance or coincidence is known to play an important role in the
beginning of career development (Bandura, 1982; Mitchell, Levin, &
Krumboltz, 1999; Pryor, Amundson, & Bright, 2008).
The National Career Development Association (2008) defines career
development as “the total constellation of psychological, sociological,
educational, physical, economic, and chance factors that combine to
influence the nature and significance of work in the total lifespan of any
given individual” (p. 2). As defined, in the process of career develop-
ment, the chance factor has been considered one of the most influential.
Mitchell et al. (1999) proposed the planned happenstance theory as a
way of explaining the chance factor of individuals’ career development.
Mitchell et al. and Pryor et al. (2008) asserted that individuals need
to take advantage of chance events as the paradigm of career develop-

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 ment changes. Mitchell et al. postulated five skills that are essential to
recognizing, creating, and using unexpected events as opportunities:
curiosity, persistence, flexibility, optimism, and risk taking. Curiosity
means exploring new learning opportunities; persistence means exert-
ing ongoing effort despite setbacks; flexibility is adapting to changing
attitudes and circumstances; optimism is viewing new opportunities as
possible and attainable; and risk taking is taking action in the face of
uncertain outcomes. The question remains, how do these five planned
happenstance skills work in the career development process? According to
Mitchell et al., people who have planned happenstance skills are actively
searching career information or activities that might be connected to
beneficial unplanned events in the future. Exploring how these behaviors
interact may help inform individuals’ career development trajectory.
The purpose of our research was to identify how planned happen-
stance skills play a role in the relationships among career engagement,
career decision self-efficacy, and career decision certainty. Self-efficacy
is enhanced through learning experiences and helps the development
of interests and goals (Lent et al., 1994). Therefore, it was hypoth-
esized that career decision self-efficacy would mediate the relationship
between career engagement (e.g., learning experiences) and career de-
cision certainty. According to planned happenstance theory (Mitchell
et al., 1999), individuals who are more engaged in career activities feel
confident in their career development only when they have sufficient
skills to recognize, create, and use unexpected events as opportunities.
Therefore, it was further hypothesized that planned happenstance skills
would moderate the relationships among career engagement, career deci-
sion self-efficacy, and career decision certainty. In summary, as shown in
Figure 1, we posited that career engagement would strengthen college
students’ career decision certainty via career decision self-efficacy only if
they had sufficient planned happenstance skills to discover and recognize
unexpected career opportunities.

Method
Participants
Questionnaires were distributed to 229 Korean college students in gen-
eral education courses at a large university in Seoul, the capital city of
South Korea. Participants were recruited from general psychology classes

Career Decision
Planned Happenstance Self-Efficacy Planned Happenstance
Skills Skills

Occupational Career Decision

Engagement Certainty

FIGURE 1
Theoretical Model

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 targeted to students from all majors. They answered a web-based survey
introduced during the class and received an extra point for participating.
However, the data from 12 students were excluded from the analysis
because of incomplete responses. Therefore, we used the data from only
217 Korean college students (106 women, 111 men). Among the 217
students, 113 (52.1%) were freshmen, 64 (29.5%) were sophomores,
21 (9.7%) were juniors, and 19 (8.8%) were seniors. The participants
were from a diversity of majors: Seven (3.2%) were majoring in business,
33 (15.2%) were majoring in engineering, 28 (12.9%) were majoring
in health science, 18 (8.3%) were majoring in education, 40 (18.4%)
were majoring in social science, 44 (20.3%) were majoring in natural
science, 40 (18.4%) were majoring in liberal arts, and six (2.8%) were
majoring in fine art. One participant (0.5%) was an exchange student,
and the major of that participant was unknown.

Measures
Occupational engagement. The Korean version of the Occupational En-
gagement Scale for Students (OES-S; Cox, 2008) was used to measure
the participants’ current status of career engagement. This scale has yet
to be validated, but it was empirically reviewed by Jung (2011) to show
that the Korean version reflected the intentions of the original scale.
The OES-S is a 14-item single-factor instrument. Sample items include
“I talk about my career choices with family or friends” and “I attend
presentations or talks related to a career I might find interesting.” There
is no item coded inversely, and each item is rated on a 5-point Likert
scale, with responses ranging from 1 (I do not agree at all) to 5 (I highly
agree). Jung reported Cronbach’s alpha, the internal consistency of this
scale, as .85; it was .89 in our study.
Career decision self-efficacy. To measure career decision self-efficacy, we
used the short form of the Career Decision Self-Efficacy Scale (CDSES-SF;
Betz, Klein, & Taylor, 1996). In our study, we used the Korean version
of the CDSES-SF, which has been validated by Lee and Lee (2000). The
CDSES-SF has 25 items and uses a 5-point Likert scale ranging from
1 (strongly disagree) to 5 (strongly agree). The CDSES-SF was used to
measure how much self-efficacy the respondents had in making career
decisions. The instrument has five subscales (Gathering Occupational
Information, Goal Selection, Plans for Implementation, Problem-Solving,
and Self-Appraisal), and there are five items for each. Sample items are
“I can choose one job among the jobs I am considering” and “I can
tell what the ideal job is for me.” A higher score means higher career
decision self-efficacy. Cronbach’s alpha was reported as .92 by Lee and
Lee; it was .93 in our study.
Career decision certainty. The Career Decision Scale (CDS; Osipow,
Carney, Winer, Yanico, & Koschir, 1976) was used to measure career
decision certainty. Ko (1992) validated the Korean version of the CDS
with a sample of Korean college students. The scale consists of 18 items
and uses a 4-point Likert scale ranging from 1 (strongly disagree) to 4
(strongly agree). The scale is divided into two levels: career certainty
(e.g., “I decided my career and feel comfortable about it”) and career
indecision (e.g., “I cannot make my career decision since I do not know
about my aptitudes and abilities well”). Career indecision level scores

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 were reversed, and the mean score of the whole scale was used as one
variable of career decision certainty. A higher score means higher career
decision certainty. Ko reported Cronbach’s alpha as .86; it was .87 in
our study.
Planned happenstance skills. The Career-Related Planned Hap-
penstance Scale (CPHS; Kim, 2012) was used to measure planned
happenstance skills essential for recognizing, creating, and utilizing
unexpected events as opportunities. The CPHS is a 15-item instru-
ment using a 5-point Likert scale ranging from 1 (strongly disagree)
to 5 (strongly agree). Based on the planned happenstance theory
(Mitchell et al., 1999), the CPHS consists of five subscales: Curios-
ity, Persistence, Flexibility, Optimism, and Risk Taking. This scale
measures the attitudes and actual behaviors regarding the unexpected
changes in career paths. The researchers valued the two concepts in
the planned happenstance theory: (a) exploration generates chance
opportunities for increasing quality of life and (b) skills enable people
to seize opportunities (Mitchell et al., 1999). The CPHS was devel-
oped to measure these two concepts, focusing on skills. Sample items
are “I enjoy exploring new careers” for Curiosity; “Despite facing
unexpected hardship in my career, I will persistently put effort on
what I can do” for Persistence; “My career path is changeable” for
Flexibility; “I believe changes in the future will work as good op-
portunities for my career” for Optimism; and “In spite of uncertain
outcomes, I will take risks for my career” for Risk Taking. Cronbach’s
alpha was .87 for the total scale in our study.

Data Analyses
Two interlinked steps were tested in our study: a simple mediation model
and a moderated mediation model. The moderated mediation model
was tested by integrating the proposed moderator variable (planned
happenstance skills in our study) into the model. As Aiken and West
(1991) suggested, all continuous variables were mean centered prior
to the analyses to reduce the multicollinearity between main effects
and interaction. For the first step of analysis, simple mediation models
were examined by using an application provided by Preacher and Hayes
(2004). Preacher and Hayes developed an SPSS macro that facilitates
estimation of the indirect effect ab, both with a normal theory approach
(i.e., the Sobel test) and with a bootstrap approach to obtain confidence
intervals (CIs). The SPSS macro also incorporates the stepwise proce-
dure described by Baron and Kenny (1986). In the next step, we again
utilized an SPSS macro designed by Preacher and colleagues (2007). By
using this macro, we predicted that the implementation of the recom-
mended bootstrapping methods would be facilitated and that a method
for probing the significance of the conditional indirect effects would be
provided at different values of the moderator variable.

Results
Means, standard deviations, and intercorrelations among variables for
all participants are presented in Table 1. An examination of the correla-
tions showed that career engagement was positively related to career
decision self-efficacy (r = .58, p < .001), planned happenstance skills

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 Table 1
Descriptive Statistics and Study Variable Intercorrelations
Variable M SD 1 2 3 4
1. Career engagement 3.20 0.67 —
2. Career decision self-
efficacy 3.33 0.58 .58** —
3. Career decision certainty 2.48 0.45 .18* .49** —
4. Planned happenstance
skills 3.51 0.52 .46** .45** .01 —
*p < .05. **p < .001.

(r = .46, p < .001), and career decision certainty (r = .18, p < .01).
Results also indicated that career decision self-efficacy positively cor-
related with planned happenstance skills (r = .45, p < .001) and career
decision certainty (r = .49, p < .001). It is interesting that no statistically
significant correlation was found between planned happenstance skills
and career decision certainty (r = .01, ns).
Next, as shown in Table 2, the results of the simple mediation model
indicated that career engagement was significantly related to career
decision self-efficacy (B = .50, t = 10.32, p < .001). The relationship
between career decision self-efficacy and career decision certainty was
also significant (B = .45, t = 8.12, p < .001) while controlling for career
engagement. Furthermore, career engagement was negatively associ-
ated with career decision certainty when controlling for career decision
self-efficacy (B = –.10, t = –2.16, p < .05). Although the direct effect
between career engagement and career decision certainty was originally
positive when controlling for career decision self-efficacy, the direction
Table 2
Regression Results for Simple Mediation
Variable B SE t z p 95% CI
Direct and total effects
Career decision certainty
regressed on career
engagement .12 .04 2.69 .008
Career decision self-
efficacy regressed on
career engagement .50 .05 10.32 .000
Career decision certainty
regressed on career
decision self-efficacy,
controlling for career
engagement .45 .06 8.12 .000
Career decision certainty
regressed on career
engagement, controlling
for career decision self-
efficacy –.10 .05 –2.16 .032
Indirect effect (IE)a .04 6.36 .000 [.15, .29]
Bootstrap results for IEb .04 0.31 [.15, .31]

Note. Unstandardized regression coefficients are reported. Bootstrap sample size =

10,000. CI = confidence interval.
a
With significance using normal distribution. IE = .22. bM = .22. 99% CI = [.13, .33].

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 of the indirect effect was negative. This indicates large size mediating
effects of career decision self-efficacy in the relationship between career
engagement and career decision certainty. Finally, an indirect effect of
career engagement on career decision certainty via career decision self-
efficacy was significant (β = .22, Sobel z = 6.36, p < .001). As shown
in Table 2, the results of bootstraping also confirmed the Sobel test
(95% CI [.15, .31] and a 99% CI [.13, .33]) for the indirect effect not
containing zero.
Next, Table 3 shows the results of the moderated mediation model.
It was hypothesized that the participants with higher scores on planned
happenstance skills would show a stronger relationship between career
engagement and career decision certainty than would those with lower
scores. Results indicated that the effect of the interaction between career
engagement and planned happenstance skills on career decision self-
efficacy was significant (B = .20, t = 2.75, p < .01). Thus, conventional
procedures were applied for plotting simple slopes (see Figure 2) when
the score of planned happenstance skills was one standard deviation
below and above the mean. The simple slope was .49 (t = 8.09, p <
.001), indicating the relationship between career engagement and career
decision self-efficacy when the scores on planned happenstance skills
were high (M + 1 SD). On the other hand, the simple slope was .28 (t
= 4.08, p < .001) when the scores on planned happenstance skills were
low (M – 1 SD). Table 3 also shows the interaction effect of planned
happenstance skills and career decision self-efficacy on career decision
certainty, but the interaction effects were not statistically significant (B
= .11, t = 1.24, ns).
Although the results indicated that the interaction effect between
planned happenstance skills and career engagement influenced career
decision certainty through career decision self-efficacy, a more detailed
examination of the conditional indirect effects model was needed. The
conditional indirect effect of career engagement on career decision
certainty through career decision self-efficacy at the values of planned
happenstance skills was analyzed when the scores of planned happen-
stance skills were the sample mean and ±1 SD. The mean of planned
happenstance was zero because the score was mean centered. It was
revealed that all of the three conditional indirect effects were significantly
positive, and bootstrap CIs supported these results not including zero
in the values (see middle of Table 3). In other words, the indirect ef-
fect of career engagement on career decision certainty through career
decision self-efficacy increased when the score on planned happenstance
skills was high. Furthermore, as shown in the bottom section of Table
3, when the range of planned happenstance skills was expanded, the
positive effect turned out to not be significant (i.e., when the mean-
centered score of career-related planned happenstance was –.96, the
indirect effect was not significant with p = .07). Thus, we can conclude
that high career engagement has no effect on increasing career decision
certainty when the score on planned happenstance skills is extremely
low. In conclusion, this significant indirect effect means that planned
happenstance skills amplify the mediation effect of career decision self-
efficacy between career engagement and career decision certainty, which
is consistent with the hypothesis.

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Table 3
Regression Results for Conditional Indirect Effect
Bootstrap 95% CI

ACACDQ_v62_n1_0314TEXT.indd 63
Variable B SE t p IE SE z p Percentile BC BCa
Career Decision Self-Efficacy (CDSE)
Constant –0.03 .03 –0.98 .331
Career engagement (CE) 0.38 .05 7.34 .000
Planned happenstance skills (PH) 0.25 .07 3.63 .000
CE × PH 0.20 .07 2.75 .006
Career Decision Certainty
Constant 2.47 .03 89.93 .000
CE –0.06 .05 –1.30 .194
PH –0.23 .06 –3.99 .000
CE × PH –0.05 .08 –0.66 .509
CDSE 0.51 .06 8.95 .000
CDSE × PH 0.11 .09 1.24 .215
Conditional Indirect Effect at Specified Values of PH
Value of PH
–1 SD (–.52) .13 .04 3.47 .001 [.08, .33] [.09, .34] [.09, .34]
M (.00) .20 .04 5.65 .000 [.19, .42] [.20, .42] [.20, .43]
+1 SD (.52) .28 .05 5.31 .000 [.25, .60] [.26, .62] [.26, .61]
Conditional Indirect Effect at Range of Values of PH
Value of PH
–1.45 .03 .05 0.67 .503
–1.29 .05 .05 0.99 .322
–1.12 .06 .04 1.37 .172
–0.96 .08 .04 1.81 .071

63
(Continued on next page)

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 64
Table 3 (Continued)

ACACDQ_v62_n1_0314TEXT.indd 64
Regression Results for Conditional Indirect Effect
Bootstrap 95% CI
Variable B SE t p IE SE z p Percentile BC BCa
Conditional Indirect Effect at Range of Values of PH
Value of PH (Continued)
–0.80 .09 .04 2.34 .020
–0.63 .11 .04 2.96 .003
–0.47 .13 .04 3.69 .000
–0.31 .15 .03 4.47 .000
–0.14 .18 .03 5.20 .000
0.02 .20 .04 5.69 .000
0.18 .23 .04 5.83 .000
0.35 .25 .04 5.67 .000
0.51 .28 .05 5.33 .000
0.67 .31 .06 4.95 .000
0.84 .34 .07 4.58 .000
1.00 .37 .09 4.24 .000
1.16 .40 .10 3.96 .000
1.33 .43 .12 3.71 .000
1.49 .47 .13 3.50 .001

Note. Unstandardized regression coefficients are reported. Bootstrap sample size = 10,000. CI = confidence interval; IE = indirect effect; BC = bias corrected;
BCa = bias corrected and accelerated.

2/10/2014 12:02:52 PM
 = Low planned happenstance skills
= High planned happenstance skills
0.5 —

0.4 —

0.3 —
Career Decision Self-Efficacy

0.2 —

0.1 —
Low High
0.0 —

–0.1 —

–0.2 —

–0.3 —

–0.4 —
—

—
M – 1 SD M + 1 SD
Career Engagement
Figure 2
Interaction Effect of Planned Happenstance Skills Between
Career Engagement and Career Decision Self-Efficacy
Note. Unstandardized regression coefficients are used.

Discussion
The purpose of our research was to identify how planned happenstance
skills play a role in the relationships among career engagement, career
decision self-efficacy, and career decision certainty. Using the moderated
mediation model, we analyzed the relationships among career engage-
ment, career decision self-efficacy, career decision certainty, and planned
happenstance skills. First, the results of our study indicated that the
planned happenstance skills variable was significantly correlated with
career engagement and career decision self-efficacy. On the other hand,
no significant relationship was found between planned happenstance
skills and career decision certainty. That is, individuals who have planned
happenstance skills are actively involved in career exploration activities
and feel confident about the career decision-making process but do
not necessarily make future career decisions. This finding needs to be
interpreted in the context of Krumboltz’s (2009) happenstance learning
theory, which suggests that the goal of career counseling is not for clients
to make a career decision by declaring their future lifetime occupation
but for clients to reframe being undecided into open-mindedness. The
individuals who have planned happenstance skills keep career options
always open, which allows them to create, recognize, and seize new

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 opportunities. Second, the results of the mediation analysis showed
that the relationship between career engagement and career decision
certainty was mediated by career decision self-efficacy. Career decision
self-efficacy in our study also acts as a primary mediated component,
which is built through learning experiences such as career engagement,
and, furthermore, it develops career decision certainty (Betz & Luzzo,
1996; Betz & Voyten, 1997; Blustein, 1989; Gushue, Scanlan, Pantzer,
& Clarke, 2006; Konstam & Lehmann, 2011; Taylor & Betz, 1983;
Taylor & Popma, 1990).
Last and most important, the moderation effect of planned happenstance
skills was significant in the relationship between career engagement and
career decision self-efficacy. Furthermore, the moderated mediation effects
between career engagement and career decision certainty through career
decision-making self-efficacy were observed to increase as the levels of planned
happenstance skills also increased. In other words, college students’ career
engagement would strengthen career decision certainty via career decision
self-efficacy only when college students had enough planned happenstance
skills. In the social cognitive career theory (SCCT) model (Lent et al., 1994),
personal input and background or contextual influences are considered as
important elements related to building learning experiences, self-efficacy,
and career goals. However, there are differences even among people with
similar self-efficacy beliefs and similar engagement in career exploration.
According to Krumboltz (2009), inadvertent events can happen to anyone,
but not everyone converts happenstance events to enhance his or her career
opportunities. Contextual factors act dissimilarly on every individual. Some
individuals can be enriched by happenstance events whereas others cannot.
The results of this research indicate that planned happenstance skills can be
one of an individual’s abilities to make the best use of surrounding contexts
or potential career opportunities. Moreover, the significant indirect effect
size indicates that planned happenstance skills have a decisive facilitation role
to enhance the decision level through the buffering effect even though they
are not a direct impact on decision status. In the career counseling field,
these results suggest that planned happenstance skills could play a crucial
role as amplifiers for clients who engage in diverse occupational activities
but cannot decide their career yet.
Traditionally, career counseling professionals have focused on help-
ing clients to make a career decision by exploring their future lifetime
occupation (Patton, Creed, & Muller, 2002; Seifert, 1993; Skorikov,
2007). However, the future cannot be predicted with any dependable
degree of certainty. In recent years, it has been increasingly reported
that unplanned influences such as chance events affect individuals’ career
decision making (e.g., Betsworth & Hansen, 1996; Bright, Pryor, &
Harpham, 2005; Chien, Fisher, & Biller, 2006; McKay, Bright, & Pryor,
2005; Pryor & Bright, 2007; Williams et al., 1998). Therefore, helping
clients to develop the skills to recognize, seize, and utilize the various
alternative career opportunities seems far more important a role for career
counselors than merely requiring clients to state a goal (Krumboltz, 2009;
Mitchell et al., 1999). The results of our study also imply that individu-
als’ career development can be successfully strengthened by the synergy
effect between planned happenstance skills and career-related variables
(e.g., career engagement and career decision self-efficacy). That is, our

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 study highlights the importance of developing planned happenstance
skills, which can be defined as the ability to take advantage of chance
events as the paradigm of career development changes.
Although the studies on chance events in career development are
increasing, most of them are theoretical papers, not empirical studies
(e.g., Bandura, 1982; Crites, 1969; Mitchell et al., 1999). Going beyond
simply stating that chance events affect career development, we believe
that it is important to examine how personal characteristics related to
chance events (planned happenstance skills in our study) affect vocational
transitions. Furthermore, more than half of the participants in our study
were freshmen. This sample allowed us to obtain a much fuller range of
scores on these measures than could be obtained from older students
who might have already taken steps toward making a decision and were,
therefore, less frequently exploring possible careers. The sample also
reflected researchers’ concerns on the relationships among career-related
variables in college students. In this sense, our study contributes to the
current need for empirical demonstration of the role of planned hap-
penstance skills. We hope that the results of our study will be useful to
practitioners as well as researchers in the career counseling field.
Despite the contributions of our study, some limitations must be
mentioned. First, the cross-sectional measures of the variables do not
allow for inferences of cause-and-effect relationships. In the future,
longitudinal studies that measure planned happenstance skills and career-
related variables over time could identify how planned happenstance
skills play a role in the career development process as people encounter
career-related happenstance events. Second, our study included only
self-reported questionnaire measurements. Although this is a typical
procedure to measure psychological variables, method variance might
have occurred. Third, this research also used four career-related scales.
Therefore, there are some common variances among these variables.
Still, there are differences in that career decision certainty is mostly used
when assessing what the respondents decided to pursue for their career,
whereas career decision self-efficacy refers to how much competence
they have in their career development. Career engagement focuses on
how the respondents behave actively toward their career development.
Also, planned happenstance skills refer to a respondent’s sense of ad-
venturous and willingness to explore career opportunities. Therefore,
future research could utilize multiple assessments methods (e.g., direct
observation or school report information) and a longitudinal approach to
measure the career-related variables, thereby giving a clearer portrait of
the long-term effects of happenstance events. Despite these limitations,
our research is meaningful in terms of identifying the role of planned
happenstance skills in the career development process. Guiding clients to
develop their curiosity, optimism, risk taking, persistency, and flexibility
could lead them to believe in themselves and feel confident that they
can make gratifying career decisions and seize the chance opportunities
associated with their career development.

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