Resilience and Reinvention: Professional Identity Construction Amidst Crisis-Induced Occupational Disruption

While Fotopoulou (2024) and Alturki & Alharbi (2024) use qualitative case studies to examine identity among teachers, this idea broadens the lens to any occupation facing existential disruption (pandemic, AI, economic shocks). The project would examine how professionals narrate, negotiate, and reinvent their identities when core aspects of their work are upended. What strategies—personal, collective, or institutional—enable resilience and adaptation? How do professionals “future-proof” their sense of self and purpose? The novelty is in systematically connecting identity construction to crisis and uncertainty, using rich, comparative case studies across diverse occupations. Such work could generate new models of professional resilience and identity transformation in volatile organizational environments.

References:

1. Saudi Female English Teachers' Professional Identity Construction: A Qualitative Study of the Internal and External Factors. Bothainh Mansoor Alturki, M. Alharbi (2024). Forum for Linguistic Studies.
2. PRE-SERVICE STUDENT-TEACHERS’ PERCEPTIONS OF THEIR PROFESSIONAL IDENTITY THROUGHOUT COVID-19 PANDEMIC: A CASE STUDY IN GREECE. Vasiliki Fotopoulou (2024). European Journal of Education Studies.