Careers in public sector science: orientations and implications Mary Mallon 1 , Joanne Duberley 2 and Laurie Cohen 3 1 Department of Human Resource Management, Private Bag, 11 222, Massey University, Palmerston North, New Zealand. M.Mallon@massey.ac.nz 2 Birmingham Business School, University of Birmingham, Edgbaston, Birmingham B15 2TT, UK. j.p.duberley@bham.ac.uk 3 The Business School, Loughborough University, Loughborough LE11 3TU, UK. l.cohen@lboro.ac.uk There is consensus that the world of science is changing (Ziman, 1994; see for example Nowotny et al., 2002). The environment in which scientists work is typified now as increasingly dynamic, managerialist and commercialised. This paper focuses on how scientists within different organisational and national contexts understand and enact their careers in the face of such changes. Based on empirical work in the UK and New Zealand, this paper introduces four career orientations evident in the career accounts of these participants. The categories are further analysed in terms of the key drivers to career: science, the organisation and the individual. Implications for career management are discussed in each section. In conclusion, the paper makes two related contributions. First, the evidence presented poses a challenge to highly individualised notions of the career actor central to current career thinking, instead revealing scientists’ continued attachment to old institutional arrangements alongside new and emerging ways of understanding career. Second, with reference to the issue of career management of research scientists, the study highlights the need for those involved in management to look beyond employing organisations to other life interests, and science itself. It argues the need for those involved in career management to recognise the variety of legitimate ways to run a scientific career. T here is an emerging consensus that we are experiencing a ‘radical, irreversible, world- wide transformation in the way that science is organised and performed’ (Ziman, 1994, p. 7), with an emphasis on application, transdisciplinar- ity, networking and collaboration and social accountability (Nowotny et al., 2002). These changes are linked to political and economic imperatives that can be seen in a variety of different countries (Alonso et al., 1999; Buhrer, 1999; Jordan, 1999). These contextual changes are likely to impact upon scientific careers, both in terms of how scientists plan and make sense of their careers and how organisations adapt their career management practices. The focus of this paper is on individual scientists’ career sense- making. There is little research on careers of scientists (or indeed other groups) that expressly acknowledges that changes in wider social context may affect how people make sense of their careers (Collin, 1997). Yet, it is important for science organisations to know more about how scientists are understanding and engaging with their careers in order that appropriate organisational career management strategies may be developed. Recognising the claims that changes in science have been worldwide, we use empirical data from public sector research scientists in the UK and R&D Management 35, 4, 2005. r Blackwell Publishing Ltd, 2005. Published by Blackwell Publishing Ltd, 395 9600 Garsington Road, Oxford OX4 2DQ, UK and 350 Main Street, Malden, MA 02148, USA.