Addressing Compassion Fatigue Using Career Engagement and the Hope-Centered Model for Career Development

ABSTRACT

The COVID-19 pandemic has exacted a toll on healthcare workers, who have been required to work during times of great chal-lenge and scarcity, as well as risk to themselves, whilst continuing to provide care for others. This desire to alleviate the suffering of others puts healthcare workers at in-creased risk of compassion fatigue, a traumatic stress response that can develop from supporting others through emotional suffering and trying to alleviate that pain (Arpa-cioglu et al., 2020;Ruiz-Fernandez et al., 2020). Increased risk to this large population poses a challenge to career practitioners, who will need effective ways of support-ing these workers in healing. This paper discusses conceptualizing compassion fatigue through a ca-reer engagement lens, and propos-es the uses of the Hope-Centered Model of Career Development as a means of supporting reengagement. Through the reinstallation of hope, feelings of agency and achievement again become possible.