In the present study, a cluster analysis of four job demands and five job resources among 328 Swedish teachers in their first year of teaching, resulted in four typical work situations:
the advantageous situation (n = 103);
the balanced situation (n = 148); the threat situation (n = 34);
and the pressed situation (n = 43).
Clear differences were found in how teachers in these different clusters perceived their work satisfaction, self-efficacy and willingness to stay, with the teachers in the former two work situations scoring significantly higher than the latter two.
The results indicate that teachers can have a very different experience of work at the start of their careers.
These findings imply that work environment interventions and induction programmes to support new teachers and prevent them from leaving the profession must be well adapted to the context.