Career Development

Introduction
• Restructuring of organizations makes it essential that
companies reconsider the concepts of career and career
management in order to retain and motivate employees.
• Companies successful at managing employee growth that
accompanies business expansion emphasize that
employees are to be responsible for career management.

Introduction (continued)
• These companies do provide
resources supporting careers
such as development
opportunities, mentoring, and
training managers in how to
coach employees.
• A major challenge is how to
balance advancing current
employees’ careers with
simultaneously attracting and
acquiring employees with new
skills.

Top 15 Retention Drivers
Retention Items %
1. Exciting work & challenge 48.4
2. Career Growth, Learning & Development 42.6
3. Working with great people & relationships 41.8
4. Fair pay 31.8
5. Supportive management/great boss 25.1
6. Being recognized, valued & respected 23.0
7. Benefits 22.0
8. Meaningful work, making a difference & contribution 17.0
9. Pride in organization, its mission & product 16.5
10. Great work environment / culture 16.0
11. Flexibility 13.6
12. Autonomy, creativity and a sense of control 12.6
13. Job security & stability 10.5
14. Location 10.3
15. Diverse, changing work assignments 7.7
Source: Career Systems International, 2005

Other Research
Retention Items
1. Career growth, learning and development
2. Exciting work and challenge
3. Meaningful work, making a difference and a contribution
4. Great people
5. Being part of a team
6. Good boss
7. Recognition for work well done
8. Fun on the job
9. Autonomy, sense of control over work
10. Flexibility – for example, in work hours and dress code
11. Fair pay and benefits
12. Inspiring leadership
13. Pride in organization, its mission and quality of product
14. Great work environment
15. Location
Source: Love ‘Em or Lose ‘Em, 1999

Purpose of Human Resource
Management
Human Resource Management -
involves attracting, developing, and
maintaining a quality workforce.
Basic Responsibilities of Human Resource Management
1. Attract a quality workforce—human resource planning,
recruitment, and selection.
2. Develop a quality workforce—employee orientation,
training, performance appraisal.
3. Maintain a quality workforce—retention and career
development.

Linking Strategic Planning and Human Resources

Step One:
Mission, Vision, and Values
• Mission
– The basic purpose of the organization as well as its scope of
operations
• Strategic Vision
– A statement about where the company is going and what it can
become in the future; clarifies the long-term direction of the
company and its strategic intent
• Core Values
– The strong and enduring beliefs and principles that the company
uses as a foundation for its decisions

Step Two: Environmental Scanning
The systematic monitoring of the major external forces
influencing the organization.
1. Economic factors: general and regional
conditions
2. Competitive trends: new processes, services,
and innovations
3. Technological changes: robotics and office
automation
4. Political and legislative issues: laws and
administrative rulings
5. Social concerns: child care and educational
priorities
6. Demographic trends: age, composition,and
literacy

Five Forces Framework

Step Three: Internal Analysis
Composition
Culture Competencies
Internal
Analysis

Scanning the Internal Environment
Cultural Audits -Audits of the culture and quality of
work life in an organization.
How do employees spend their time?
How do they interact with each other?
Are employees empowered?
What is the predominant leadership
style of managers?
How do employees advance within the
organization ?

Competitive Advantage through
People
• Core Competencies
– Integrated knowledge sets within an
organization that distinguish it from its
competitors and deliver value to
customers.
• Sustained competitive advantage
through people is achieved if these
human resources:
1. Are valuable.
2. Are rare and unavailable to
competitors.
3. Are difficult to imitate.
4. Are organized for synergy.

Composition: The Human Capital
Architecture
• Core knowledge workers
– Employees who have firm-specific skills
that are directly linked to the company’s
strategy.
• Example: Senior software programmer
• Traditional job-based employees
– Employees with skills to perform a
predefined job that are quite valuable to a
company, but not unique.
• Example: Security guard

Composition: The Human Capital
Architecture (cont’d)
• Contract labor
– Employees whose skills are of less
strategic value and generally available to
all firms.
• Example: General electrician
• Alliance/partners
– Individuals and groups with unique
skills, but those skills are not directly
related to a company’s core strategy.
• Example: Independent product label
designer

Human Resource Practices
• Human resource planning is the process of analyzing staffing needs and
identifying actions that should be taken to satisfy them over time.

Traditional Versus Career Development Focus
Source: Adapted from Fred L. Otte and Peggy G. Hutcheson, Helping Employees Manage
Careers (Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1992), p. 10.

HR is growing in importance, if…
…we envision and manage HR as a business
Human Capital Strategy to Achieve
the Enterprise Strategy
Dependable HR Controls
High
Performance
Talent
High
Performance
Organization
Competitive
HR
Services
Human Capital Strategy to Achieve
the Enterprise Strategy
Dependable HR Controls
High
Performance
Talent
High
Performance
Organization
Competitive
HR
Services
Enterprise Strategy
and Objectives
Financial Markets
Returns in excess of
alternatives
Financial Markets
Returns in excess of
alternatives
Public Policy and
Reputation
Conformity with
expectations
Public Policy and
Reputation
Conformity with
expectations
Talent Markets
Employer of choice –
Employees of choice
Talent Markets
Employer of choice –
Employees of choice
Consumer Markets
Value delivery better than
competitors
Consumer Markets
Value delivery better than
competitorsWhat Business is
HR In?

Performance Appraisals
• Performance Appraisal
– The process of formally
evaluating performance and
feedback to an employee
Two Purposes of Performance Appraisal
1. Evaluation—document and let people know how
well they are
doing; judgmental role.
2. Development—identify how training and support
can improve
performance; counseling role.

Retention And Career Development
• Career Development
– Manages how a person
grows and progresses in their
career
• Career Planning
– The process of managing
career goals and individual
capabilities with
opportunities for their
fulfillment

Career and Health
• High levels of career uncertainty and
occupational dissatisfaction are
positively correlated with high levels of
psychological and physical distress
(Herr, 1989).
• High levels of unemployment are
associated with increased rates of
chemical dependency, interpersonal
violence, suicide, criminal activity, and
admissions to psychiatric facilities
(Herr, Cramer, & Niles, 2004).

The Basics of Career Management
• Career
– The occupational positions a person
has had over many years.
• Career management
– The process for enabling employees
to better understand and develop
their career skills and interests, and
to use these skills and interests
more effectively.
• Career development
– The lifelong series of activities that
contribute to a person’s career
exploration, establishment, success,
and fulfillment.

The Basics of Career Management
• Career planning
– The deliberate process through
which someone becomes aware of
personal skills, interests,
knowledge, motivations, and other
characteristics; and establishes
action plans to attain specific
goals.
• Careers today
– Careers are no simple progressions
of employment in one or two firms
with a single profession.
– Employees now want to exchange
performance for training, learning,
and development that keep them
marketable.

26
The Meaning of “WORK”
“Work is undeniably one of the most
essential of all human activities. For a start,
it is the basis of economic survival of
individuals… and society. Beyond this, an
individual’s job structures much of her or
his time and, one hopes, provides a source
of personal fulfillment. An occupation also
shapes one’s identity and, in the eyes of
others, largely determines an individual’s
status or position in society”
Work, Industry, and Canadian Society, Krahn
& Lowe. 1996

Why Is Career Management Important?
From the company’s perspective, the failure to
motivate employees to plan their careers can result
in:
– A shortage of employees to fill open positions
– Lower employee commitment
– Inappropriate use of monies allocated for training
and development programs

Why Is Career Management Important?
(continued)
• From the employees’
perspective, lack of career
management can result in:
– Frustration
– Feelings of not being valued
by the company
– Being unable to find suitable
employment should a job
change be necessary due to
mergers, acquisitions,
restructuring, or downsizing.

Career Management and Career Motivation
• Career motivation refers to:
– Employees’ energy to invest in their
careers
– Their awareness of the direction
they want their careers to take
– The ability to maintain energy and
direction despite barriers they may
encounter
• Career motivation has three
aspects:
– Career resilience
– Career insight
– Career identity

The Value of Career Motivation
Components of Career Motivation
Career Resilience Company Value
• Innovation
• Employees adapting to unexpected changes
• Commitment to Company
• Pride in Work
Employee Value
• Be aware of skill strengths and weaknesses
• Participate in learning activities
• Cope with less than ideal working
conditions
• Avoid skill obsolescence
Career Insight
Career Identity

What Is A Career?
• Traditional Career
– Sequence of positions held within
an occupation
– Context of mobility is within an
organization
– Characteristic of the employee
• Protean Career
– Frequently changing based on
changes in the person and
changes in the work environment
– Employees take major
responsibility for managing their
careers

Comparison of
Traditional Career and Protean Career
Dimension Traditional Career Protean Career
Goal Promotions
Salary increase
Psychological success
Psychological contract Security for commitment Employability for flexibility
Mobility Vertical Lateral
Responsibility for
Management
Company Employee
Pattern Linear and expert Spiral and transitory
Expertise Know how Learn how
Development Heavy reliance on formal
training
Greater reliance on relationships
and job experiences

A Model of Career Development
• Career development is the process by which
employees progress through a series of stages.
• Each stage is characterized by a different set of
developmental tasks, activities, and relationships.
• There are four career stages:
– Exploration
– Establishment
– Maintenance
– Disengagement

A Model of Career Development (continued)
Exploration Establishment Maintenance Disengagement
Developmental
tasks
Identify interests,
skills, fit between
self and work
Advancement,
growth, security,
develop life style
Hold on to
accomplishments
, update skills
Retirement
planning, change
balance between
work and non-
work
Activities Helping
Learning
Following
directions
Making
independent
contributions
Training
Sponsoring
Policy making
Phasing out of
work
Relationships
to other
employees
Apprentice Colleague Mentor Sponsor
Typical age Less than 30 30 – 45 45 – 60 61+
Years on job Less than 2 years 2 – 10 years More than 10
years
More than 10
years

Career Path on Telco Industry

The Individual
• Accept responsibility for your own career.
• Assess your interests, skills, and values.
• Seek out career information and resources.
• Establish goals and career plans.
• Utilize development opportunities.
• Talk with your manager about your career.
• Follow through on realistic career plans.
The Manager
• Provide timely performance feedback.
• Provide developmental assignments and support.
• Participate in career development discussions.
• Support employee development plans.
The Organization
• Communicate mission, policies, and procedures.
• Provide training and development opportunities.
• Provide career information and career programs.
• Offer a variety of career options.
Roles in Career
Development
Source: Fred L. Otte and Peggy G. Hutcheson, Helping
Employees Manage Careers (Upper Saddle River, NJ:
Prentice Hall, 1992), p. 56.

Career Development Process
1. Discovery
Determine Where You
Want To Go
2. Assessment
Identify strengths &
development areas
3. Planning
Make a Career
Development Plan
4. Preparation
Get closer to your
goal
Management
Support
and Coaching

RATE THE SUCCESS OF YOUR
SUCCESSION PLANNING
For each characteristic of a best-
practice succession-planning and
management program appearing in
the left column below, enter a
number to the right to indicate how
well you believe your organization
manages that characteristic. Ask
other decision makers in your
organization to complete this form
individually. Then compile the
scores and compare notes.
Succession-Planning
Checklist
Scores
Source: From William J. Rothwell, “Putting Success into Your Succession Planning,” The Journal
of Business Strategy 23, no. 3 (May/June 2002): 32–37. Republished with permission—
Thomson Media, One State Street, 26th Floor, New York, NY 10004.

Sample Agenda—
Two-Day Career
Planning Workshop
Source: Fred L. Otte and Peggy Hutcheson, Helping Employees
Manage Careers (Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1992),
pp. 22–23. In addition to career development training and
follow-up support, First USA Bank has also outfitted special
career development facilities at its work sites that employees
can use on company time. These contain materials such as career
assessment and planning tools.

Employee Career
Development Plan
Source: Reprinted with permission of the publisher, HRnext.com Copyright HRnext.com, 2003.

Design factors of Effective Career
Management Systems
• System is positioned as a
response to a business need.
• Employees and managers
participate in development
of the system.
• Employees are encouraged
to take an active role in
career management.
• Evaluation is ongoing and
used to improve the system.

Design factors of Effective Career
Management Systems (continued)
• Business units can customize
the system for their own
purposes.
• Employees need access to
career information sources.
• Senior management supports
the career system.
• Career management is linked
to other human resource
practices such as training,
recruiting systems, and
performance management.

Traditional talent management is not up to the
challenge
Deficiencies
• Minimal alignment with business strategy
• Less effective given labor market realities
• Does not maximize the “yield”
RetainDevelopAcquire
Heavy reliance on
external recruitment
to meet immediate
needs
Driven by compensation
benchmarks and surveys
Largely a function
of training
expenditures
Deploy
Assignments for
“A” Players

3. Connect
2. Deploy1. Develop
Acquire Retain
Connect
Create networks and
high-quality
relationships that
maximize performance
Deploy
Broaden and
deepen capability
through stretch
assignments
Develop
Build capability
through on-the-job
learning
A new model focuses on develop, deploy,
connect
Advantages
• Focused on productivity of critical talent
• Creates dividends for acquisition and retention

In an environment of skills shortages and limited resources, the
focus must shift from managing “A” players to “A” positions
From “A” Players To “A” Positions
How do we support
our most critical
positions?
How do we support our
top performers?
A Critical Workforce Segment-Based
Talent Strategy
A new model focuses on develop, deploy,
connect

A new model focuses on develop, deploy, connect
Building a critical workforce segment strategy: example
Business Unit Strategic Plan
Build new technologies
Grow Asia
HR, Finance, IT,
Supply Chain
Sales and
Marketing
Business
Development
Global Key
Account Mgr
Sales
Analyst
Strategic
Support
Strategic
Support
Technology
Platform Mgr
Demand
Planning Mgr
Critical
Position
Strategic
Support
HR Business
Partner
AP Analyst
Critical
Position
Core
Support
For Core Support Positions
• Reduce talent investments or outsource
For Strategic Support Positions
• Maintain investments and buy talent
For Critical Positions – regardless of level
• Increase access to investments and build
talent by feeding from strategic support
positions

A new model focuses on develop, deploy,
connect
Workforce planning focuses HR programs levers that will most
effectively meet the business demand for critical talent
1. Talent Demand
Forecast
2. Talent Supply
Forecast
Driven by business plans
and workforce attrition
Internal and
external labor
market factors4. Talent Management
Programs
3. Talent Management
Objectives
Serves to define:
• Future business demand for critical talent
• Opportunities presented by the external market
• Potential to maximize existing talent

Connect
DeployDevelop
Capability
Commitment
Performance
Alignment
A new model focuses on develop, deploy,
connect
• Formal training helpful for meeting
specific requirements
• Learning is social in nature - people
learn through their interactions with
others, especially when tasked with
real-life issues
• People are more committed to the
learning that occurs when they are
“tested” in ways that matter, especially
when they collaborate with or are
accountable to others
Develop: Ensuring that critical workforce segments are acquiring
cutting edge skills to drive innovation

A new model focuses on develop, deploy,
connect
• People learn the most in jobs that
stretch them to grow, tap their unique
skills, and fuel their imaginations
• The best organizations avoid
pigeonholing people based on the
confines of their resumes
• They also employ formal systems to
manage performance - And they offer
frequent dialogue and feedback
Deploy: Strategic deployment of critical workforce segments will
enable intensified growth
Connect
DeployDevelop
Capability
Commitment
Performance
Alignment

A new model focuses on develop, deploy,
connect
• People-to-People: Cultivate high-
performance networks of high-quality
relationships (i.e., CoPs, knowledge
management programs)
• People-to-Purpose: Build and sustain a
sense of personal and organizational
mission
• People-to-Resources: Manage
knowledge, technology, tools, capital,
time, and physical space to achieve
professional and business goals
Connect: Connecting talent in critical workforce segments converts
knowledge into productive action
Connect
DeployDevelop
Capability
Commitment
Performance
Alignment

Employees’ Role in Career Management
• Take the initiative to ask for
feedback from managers and
peers regarding their skill
strengths and weaknesses.
• Identify their stage of career
development and
development needs.
• Seek challenges by gaining
exposure to learning
opportunities.
• Interact with employees from
different work groups inside
and outside the company.
• Create visibility through good
performance.

Managers’ Role in Career Management
Roles Responsibilities
Coach Probe problems, interests, values, needs
Listen
Clarify concerns
Define concerns
Appraiser Give feedback
Clarify company standards
Clarify job responsibilities
Clarify company needs
Advisor Generate options, experiences, and relationships
Assist in goal setting
Provide recommendations
Referral agent Link to career management resources
Follow up on career management plan

HR Manager’s Role in Career Management
• Provide information or
advice about training and
development
opportunities.
• Provide specialized
services such as testing to
determine employees’
values, interests, and
skills.
• Help prepare employees
for job searches.
• Offer counseling on
career-related problems.

Company’s Role in Career Management
Companies are responsible for
providing employees with the
resources needed to be
successful in career planning:
– Career workshops
– Information on career and
job opportunities
– Career planning workbooks
– Career counseling
– Career paths

Evaluating Career Management Systems
• Career management systems need
to be evaluated to ensure that they
are meeting the needs of
employees and the business.
• Two types of outcomes can be
used to evaluate:
– Reactions of the customers
(employees and managers) who use
the career management system
– Results of the career management
system
• Evaluation of a career
management system should be
based on its objectives.