Career development is the number one thing employees want from employers, according to Beverly Kaye. It’s the most effective way to get workers engaged, motivated, productive and just genuinely excited about coming to work each day.
But development is about so much more than traditional advancement paths, according to Kaye, founder of Career Systems International and a bestselling author.
“Although there’s a myth that says everybody wants to move up, nowadays that’s not true. But people do want to know they have growth options within the organization,” said Kaye, speaking at a Strategic Capability Network (SCNetwork) event in October.
Her most recent book, Help them Grow or Watch them Go, was released in 2012 and is based on Kaye’s work over the last 40 years, examining how organizations value and invest in their talent.
Challenging, growing employees so they don’t leave
“What I see in organizations, as far as engagement and retention, is people are saying, ‘Challenge me. Keep me at my cutting edge. Grow me,’” she said.
And if people don’t feel they are growing and being challenged, they will go.
“And by go I mean they will actually leave, go to the competition, go to a startup, try something on their own. Or worse, they will leave but stay,” she said.
If employees do “leave but stay,” it means they’ll continue to show up for work but their hearts aren’t in the job and the efforts they put forth will be minimal, said Kaye.
That’s why career development has to be a priority, no matter what time constraints a manager might be dealing with, she said.
“What I’m going to suggest to you is that the conversation happens like this: In one-minute, two-minute, 10-minute bits, all the way through the day, every day. And if you just watch for the clues, you’ll see opportunities to have quick conversations — it doesn’t have to be once a year.”
And having those conversations effectively is based on curiosity — which is a critical part of career development.
“How come people are curious about the data but not about the person?” said Kaye.
“If you’re not curious, how do you know how to negotiate? If you’re not curious, how do you problem-solve? Curiosity is so basic and some of us, we have it for our subject matter but not for people.”
But genuine interest and curiosity on the employer’s part is not the only thing employees want. They also want to know where the organization is going and where they might have opportunities to grow.
Stay interviews
That’s why stay interviews are an important tool for retaining employees who might have an eye on the exit sign.
“You’ve got to do stay interviews. You’ve got to ask the question, ‘What can I do to keep you?’ all the time,” said Kaye.
“Your main assets are your people… and they could be depreciating assets or appreciating assets, depending on how you treat them.”
But while frequent and candid conversations are important, career development is not just a manager’s job, she said. It’s up to employees to own their career development — and managers need to show them how.
Going beyond promotions
So how should managers or employers support career development and growth? There are many ways to do so, aside from simply handing out promotions, said Kaye.
“We could never give the (career) ladder to everybody who deserved it,” she said. “We have to have another metaphor.”
Development is not about “climbing the ladder” or traditional ideas of career advancement — it’s about growth, curiosity, constant learning and teamwork. It’s not about simply having a better job title or a bigger office, said Kaye — there’s more than one way to be a leader.
“The real contributors in 21st-century organizations are going to be horizontal leaders… power comes less from controlling people who report to you and more from aligning stakeholders around you,” she said.
Effective career development requires more of a focus on career patterns — not career paths, she said. And it’s no longer OK to consider development as an “extra” or a luxury.
“While it used to be a nicety, it is now a necessity,” she said. “You want more productivity, you want more innovation, you’ve got to help people in your organization find the sweet spot.”
Finding the sweet spot...
So how can an employee find that career “sweet spot” when the guiding metaphor of a career ladder is gone?
One way is by creating a new metaphor for career development, said Kaye, who replaces the ladder with the idea of a climbing wall, with all kinds of different paths, footholds and patterns.
“You rarely go straight up,” she said. “You have to look for ‘What’s the best route for me?’”