How to help employees reimagine their future career

The ability to imagine a future career path plays a big part in the decision to stay within an organisation.

Research shows that those confident in their career path are over 3 times more likely to stay with their current employer for the next year.

So, what can HR leaders do to boost employee retention?

Of course, it is not only about future roles; pay, reward, values, development opportunities and working practices all contribute.

And career aspirations do change. What might be important at one point in a career maybe less so at another. Priorities shift and interests develop.

Rather than second guess, many organisations shift ownership to the employee for their career progression. Unfortunately, in many organisations it stops there.

We ask: Is this enough?

Can organisations look beyond simply shifting the exploration of likely career progression to the employee? Can they help them to reimagine their career future?

Offer roles employees haven’t even thought about and uncovering the blind spots

Many organisations are already helping employees to explore their futures through career path mapping. That is, they can take a look at next step roles – upwards or sideways – and to understand the competencies they might need to develop, the timescale in which they might move and, in some companies, what the following step might be.

And our Talent Navigator is used in exactly these situations, helping individuals to try out different career paths and deciding what action to take.

However, it relies on a wider view of what their future could be, than just the obvious moves.

What if you, as the HR lead, could hold a mirror up to their skills and combine this with knowledge of how others with similar strengths and aspirations have developed and progressed?

This is the new functionality built into our Talent platform. It takes career path mapping far further than ever before.

Now, sales folk won’t only see a career path in sales, or marketing, or account management, but could be shown a route that takes them into product development or HR or customer engagement.

Then, what we call ‘Great Match’, suggests new, previously unconsidered career options to individuals based on their skills and competencies, and career paths taken by others.

This will transform career conversations.

To prepare, organisations need to have:

#1 Open and honest conversations about careers

HR can help managers have career-specific ‘Check-ins’ where managers can explore their team’s career ideas and aspirations.

And to share their own insights about how roles might change and develop – and how these might tie in with the employee’s thinking.

As the HR leader, you can set the clear expectation that career progression is something to be talked about. If an employee is serious about a career move, they can ‘tag’ it so that it gets picked up in the Succession Planning module, Talent Successor.

#2 Employees who understand their own skills and motivations

Employees gain so much insight from 360 reviews and from performance feedback. They shine a light on what they do well and where they might want to focus development. However, it’s important to translate the feedback. Our Talent 360 report has an inbuilt graphic that highlights both strengths and blind spots and the Skills module within the platform contains a detailed and personalised skills profile so they can see what they bring to a role.

#3 The tools in place for employees to explore career paths and drive progression

Employees are keen to spend time to explore their ideas and, when done in a highly visual way, it brings different career routes and pathways to life. They can also review any development needs they would need to address; thereby putting them in the driving seat and taking on the personal responsibility for their progression.

Do you have these fundamentals in place? If not, let’s have a call and see if we can help you move forward.

If you are already helping your employees plan their careers, now is the time to think of the next stage.

Let’s talk about our Great Match thinking.