The chaotic initial stages of the Covid-19 pandemic severely challenged organizations. Economies shut down and millions of people were confined to their homes. Human resource practitioners turned to organizational coaching, a trusted human resource development intervention for help, however, to remain relevant during the crisis coaches had to adapt their praxis. The working alliance describes the mutual bond, goal, and task alignment between coach and client and is an indication of coaching efficacy. This study investigates to what extent organizational coaches' praxis adaptation at the start of the pandemic maintained a working alliance that still served the human resource development (HRD) paradigms of learning, performance, and meaningful work. Interviews with 26 organizational coaches from USA, UK, Australia, and South Africa recorded during the first general lockdown (April 2020) were inductively analyzed using thematic analysis and deductively interpreted through the working alliance theory and desired HRD outcome paradigms. Findings reveal seven organizational coaching praxis adaptations judged to support all three working alliance components, with "task" and "goal" more prominent than "bond," suggesting a pragmatist preference reminiscent of crisis management. Praxis adaptation also seems to promote all three HRD paradigms of learning, performance, and meaningful work on individual and/or organizational levels. This study strengthens the already well-established link between HRD and coaching by positing that coaching is a dynamic, pragmatic, self-adaptive intervention that supports HRD during a crisis. Understanding coaches' praxis adaptation during the volatile initial stages of a crisis is important for HRD theory and practice given HRDs increasing reliance on coaching.

While many studies that have been conducted in recent years examining the education and workforce outcomes of STEM graduates, few have focused on the behavioral and social sciences (BSS). Federal agencies, such as National Institutes of Health (NIH), are implementing policies to foster multidisciplinary research in an effort to find more effective solutions to complex problems. As a result, there is growing interest in the career pathways of BSS scientists. This study seeks to increase our understanding of how BSS graduates, particularly women and underrepresented minorities, transition to employment within their respective fields. The focus of this research is the impact of horizontal mismatch, defined as the misalignment between a worker's degree and occupational fields, on job satisfaction and wage outcomes. This analysis of returns to education when mismatch occurs, including a comparison among majors and various demographic groups, provides insights into the labor market experiences of these scientists. Mismatched graduates were found to be much more vulnerable, earning less, and having lower job satisfaction, than their counterparts employed in jobs that aligned with their field of study. Additional job-related training was found to have a positive influence on these outcomes. Also of interest in this study were variations in wage penalties and job satisfaction between groups having different gender and race diversity characteristics. These findings are useful to human resource development (HRD) professionals, governmental policymakers, and other stakeholders seeking strategies to improve the workforce outcomes of BSS scientists.