The study, published open access in Discover Psychology, is grounded in positive psychology rather than in the deficit-focused tradition that has long dominated occupational research. Instead of asking what breaks accountants under pressure, the team asked what builds them up. Their framework drew on four candidate strengths: proactivity, the dispositional tendency to anticipate change and act on it before being forced to; self-esteem, the overall evaluative judgment a person makes of their own worth; goal orientation, the motivational pattern that directs effort toward learning and mastery; and occupational prestige, the social standing attached to the profession itself. Career adaptability, the outcome variable, is a construct from career construction theory describing the resources people use to face occupational transitions, encompassing concern about the future, control over one’s path, curiosity about possibilities, and confidence in one’s abilities.

Methodologically, the researchers employed a quantitative cross-sectional survey design, distributing validated questionnaires to professional accountants in Indonesia and analyzing the resulting data with Structural Equation Modeling using partial least squares, commonly abbreviated as PLS-SEM. This technique is well suited to studies that test theoretically derived relationships among latent psychological constructs, because it estimates measurement models and structural paths simultaneously while tolerating moderately complex models. The sample of 149 respondents, though modest by big-data standards, is appropriate for PLS-SEM, which performs reliably with samples of this size when construct reliability and validity criteria are met. The research protocol received ethical approval from the Health Research Ethics Committee of Hasanuddin University’s Faculty of Dentistry in December 2023, and all participants gave informed consent before taking part.

The headline finding is strikingly clean: proactive personality and goal orientation significantly predict career adaptability, and they do so both directly and indirectly through self-esteem. In other words, accountants who habitually scan the horizon for change and take initiative tend to be more adaptable, and part of that advantage flows through a stronger sense of self-worth. Goal-oriented professionals, those motivated to learn, master new skills, and pursue objectives, show the same pattern. The indirect pathway matters because it reveals a psychological mechanism: proactivity and goal pursuit do not merely generate more adaptive behavior; they also nourish the self-esteem that gives professionals the confidence to confront uncertainty in the first place.

Not every candidate strength earned its place in the final model. Occupational prestige, the external social status of the accounting profession, did not emerge as a significant predictor of career adaptability in the way the internal psychological dispositions did. This null result carries its own message for the era of Society 5.0. It suggests that adaptability is not something conferred from outside by a prestigious title or a respected professional designation. It is built from within, from the dispositions and motivational habits that individuals carry into their work. For a profession whose identity has historically been anchored in certification, regulation, and social standing, the finding is a quiet but pointed challenge: the credentials that once guaranteed relevance cannot substitute for the psychological resources that digital transformation now demands.

Why should this matter to anyone outside Indonesian accounting? Because the accounting profession functions as a kind of canary in the coal mine for knowledge work generally. Accountants were among the first professionals to see routine cognitive tasks, bookkeeping, reconciliation, basic compliance, automated at scale, and their experience previews what is coming for lawyers, engineers, analysts, and administrators worldwide. Society 5.0, a concept originating in Japan’s national science and technology policy, envisions a human-centered society that merges cyberspace and physical space through technologies such as artificial intelligence, robotics, and the Internet of Things. In such a society, the professionals who thrive will not be those who compete with machines at machine tasks, but those who can continuously redefine their human contribution. Career adaptability is, in this sense, the psychological currency of the coming decades.

The theoretical contribution of the study lies in extending positive psychology into professional contexts undergoing digital disruption. Much of the existing literature on technological change in workplaces has emphasized stress, job insecurity, and technophobia, framing automation as a threat to be mitigated. By demonstrating that psychological strengths foster resilience, adaptability, and flourishing under precisely these conditions, the Indonesian team reframes the narrative. Disruption, on this reading, is not inherently corrosive; it is an opportunity structure, and the individuals best positioned to exploit it are those with proactive dispositions, learning-oriented motivation, and healthy self-esteem. This aligns with the broader career construction literature, in which adaptability resources are understood as psychological capacities that can be assessed, and crucially, cultivated.

The practical implications reach two audiences at once. For organizations, the findings argue for strength-based interventions rather than deficit-based training. Instead of merely teaching accountants to operate new software, firms could design development programs that reward initiative, set stretch goals, and provide experiences that build genuine self-esteem through mastery. Mentoring schemes, rotational assignments, and innovation projects all offer venues in which proactivity and goal orientation can be exercised and strengthened. For accounting education, the message is equally direct. Curricula built solely on technical standards risk producing graduates who are technically competent but psychologically fragile in the face of change. Embedding adaptability training, goal-setting practice, and self-efficacy development into professional education could produce a generation of accountants who treat each new wave of automation as a career opportunity rather than an existential threat.

The study also carries implications for lifelong adaptability as a policy concern. Indonesia, like many emerging economies, is investing heavily in digital infrastructure and aspires to position its workforce for the Society 5.0 economy. If adaptability depends on internal psychological strengths, then national upskilling programs that focus exclusively on digital literacy may miss half the equation. Complementing technical training with psychological capacity building, fostering proactivity, mastery motivation, and self-worth, could yield workforces that are not only skilled but genuinely resilient. The finding that self-esteem mediates the relationship between strengths and adaptability suggests a concrete lever: interventions that successfully raise authentic self-esteem among professionals may amplify the adaptive benefits of their existing proactivity and goal orientation.

Certain caveats frame the scope of these conclusions. The data are cross-sectional, drawn from a single national professional context, and self-reported, so causal claims and generalizations to other professions and cultures must be made cautiously. The authors themselves position the work as an extension of psychological theory into professional settings, and future longitudinal designs could track how adaptability develops as automation deepens. Yet even with those limits, the study’s core insight travels well. In an era when machines absorb the routine and humans are left with the ambiguous, the creative, and the relational, the decisive professional asset is not what you know at any given moment but how readily you can change what you know. For 149 Indonesian accountants at least, the capacity to change begins with a proactive spirit, a goal-directed mind, and the quiet confidence that comes from believing you are capable of meeting whatever comes next.

Subject of Research: Psychological strengths predicting career adaptability among professional accountants undergoing digital transformation

Article Title: Psychological strengths and career adaptability among Indonesian professional accountants in the era of Society 5.0

Article References: Pontoh, G. T., Mediaty, Ferdiansah, M. I., Baja, H. K., Mardiana, Y. R., Nurtanio, I., Jermias, J., Halim, L. V., Christian, F., Ibrahim, E. C., Upa, V. A., & Hamzah, H. (2026). Psychological strengths and career adaptability among Indonesian professional accountants in the era of Society 5.0. Discover Psychology. https://doi.org/10.1007/s44202-026-00902-5

Image Credits: AI Generated

DOI: 10.1007/s44202-026-00902-5

Keywords: career adaptability, psychological strengths, proactive personality, self-esteem, goal orientation, Society 5.0, accounting profession, positive psychology, digital transformation, PLS-SEM, Indonesia, occupational psychology