Globalization and its impact on careers is a contextual factor that has rapidly shaped the organization of work, how it is done, who does it, and where it is done. The concept of globalization tends to be at the center of what many scholars perceive to be a major shift in the nature of work, as it almost affects every aspect of their career.
Globalization can be seen as the spread of products, technology, information, and jobs across national borders and cultures, which has resulted in higher integration or interdependence of human societies.
Corporations in developed nations can gain a competitive edge through globalization as the benefits of globalization have been questioned, as the positive effects are not necessarily distributed equally.
On the other hand, Globalization has brought about shrinkage of the world into a global village, a revolution in information technology, the collapse of boundaries between different worlds, expanding connectivity of all forms of interactions.
There are positive and negative influences of globalization on the career life of Nigeria.
The positive influences include:
Globalization has enriched the career world economically, scientifically, and culturally by opening the economies to a wide variety of consumption of goods, new technology, and knowledge.
In addition, new designs, production technology, new managerial practices needed for career advancement are made available to people, thereby, increasing the rate of career development.
Globalization creates global marketplaces, which, with the development in communication technology, can be accessed by any person from any location in the world, thereby, opening a world of opportunities for various career paths and businesses as well.
Globalization makes career advancement easier because one can conduct various researches on his or her career path and access websites of different authors, organizations, and companies in different countries.
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On the other hand, the negative impacts of globalization include:
Economic globalization may first have an impact on the number of jobs available for various careers, this means that it tends to increase the unemployment rate in the economy, thereby, rendering some individuals jobless.
Due to the widespread of technology, some major career paths have been shut down as technological applications have gradually taken up those jobs, this has rendered many individuals on such career paths jobless.
One of the major negative effects of globalization through ICT is the exposure of the Youth to the negative aspect of Western culture.
Exposure to things such as pornography, money laundering, cultism, international terrorism, child abuse, and cyber crimes has caused more harm to the careers of most individuals.
It is extremely difficult for Nigeria, with strong Christian and Islamic cultures, to tolerate the level of pornographic activities that go on on the Internet.
In addition, it has intensified international competition and encouraged employers to find ways to decrease their costs of production of goods and services, and has adopted advanced technology to increase productivity and decrease the number of workers necessary to perform the tasks essential to a particular workplace.
Transferring jobs to other nations and immigration of well-trained persons affect which jobs are available and the competition for those jobs—and this, in turn, changes the career pathways available to citizens in the country, from which the jobs were removed and also in the country that receives the jobs.
In both direct and indirect ways, globalization has affected the career paths available and the organization of work in Nigeria.
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