Skip to Main Content
HBS Home
  • About
  • Academic Programs
  • Alumni
  • Faculty & Research
  • Baker Library
  • Giving
  • Harvard Business Review
  • Initiatives
  • News
  • Recruit
  • Map / Directions
Faculty & Research
  • Faculty
  • Research
  • Featured Topics
  • Academic Units
  • …→
  • Harvard Business School→
  • Faculty & Research→
Publications
Publications
  • March–April 2017
  • Article
  • Organization Science

Sink or Swim: The Role of Workplace Context in Shaping Career Advancement and Human-Capital Development

By: Shinjinee Chattopadhyay and Prithwiraj Choudhury
  • Format:Print
ShareBar

Abstract

We develop and test predictions on how early-career challenges arising from the workplace context affect short- and long-term career advancement of individuals. Typically an organization’s decision to deploy a manager to one of several possible contexts is endogenous to unobservable factors, and selection makes it challenging to disentangle the effect of workplace context on individual career advancement. We work around this problem by studying an organization, the Indian Administrative Services, which deploys entry-level managers quasi-randomly across India. We find that managers deployed to more challenging contexts early in their careers experience faster career advancement in the short term. We present suggestive evidence that this is because challenging contexts provide managers more opportunities to develop skills (“crucible experiences”) and a greater motivation to relocate out of the challenging context. We also find that managers deployed to a challenging context early in their careers continue to experience faster advancement in the long term, suggesting that initial deployment to a challenging context is associated with human capital development. Managers initially deployed to more challenging contexts were not, however, more likely to break into the upper echelons of the organization.

Keywords

Workplace Context; Career Advancement; Context; Situation or Environment; Human Capital; Personal Development and Career; Performance

Citation

Chattopadhyay, Shinjinee, and Prithwiraj Choudhury. "Sink or Swim: The Role of Workplace Context in Shaping Career Advancement and Human-Capital Development." Organization Science 28, no. 2 (March–April 2017): 211–227.
  • Find it at Harvard
  • Read Now

About The Author

Prithwiraj Choudhury

Technology and Operations Management
→More Publications

More from the Authors

    • March 2023
    • Faculty Research

    TCS: From Physical Offices to Borderless Work Video Supplement

    By: Prithwiraj Choudhury
    • March 2023
    • Faculty Research

    GitLab and the Future of All-Remote Work Video Supplement

    By: Prithwiraj Choudhury
    • February 2023
    • Faculty Research

    Managing the Geography of Work

    By: Prithwiraj Choudhury
More from the Authors
  • TCS: From Physical Offices to Borderless Work Video Supplement By: Prithwiraj Choudhury
  • GitLab and the Future of All-Remote Work Video Supplement By: Prithwiraj Choudhury
  • Managing the Geography of Work By: Prithwiraj Choudhury
ǁ
Campus Map
Harvard Business School
Soldiers Field
Boston, MA 02163
→Map & Directions
→More Contact Information
  • Make a Gift
  • Site Map
  • Jobs
  • Harvard University
  • Trademarks
  • Policies
  • Accessibility
  • Digital Accessibility
Copyright © President & Fellows of Harvard College