What does "managing your employees' careers" mean today? We constantly hear talk of "making the employee the actor in his or her career". Can we interpret this as a form of disengagement from the HR sphere in this area?
On the contrary, this critical dimension of HR policy consists in taking into account the varied expectations of talent and forging a culture, supported by instruments, that can enrich the company with the sum of each talent that makes it up.
In this article, we'll define this practice, look at how it's evolving, consider the issues at stake and how to bring it to life in the organization.
What is career management?
Career management is a pragmatic and efficient way of allocating skills . This strategy is designed to offer employees the means to project themselves into various roles and responsibilities, based on their aptitudes.
Contrary to popular belief, the main aim of this discipline is not to retain talent.
Its vocation is to shape a method that contributes first and foremost to the company's performance and, secondly, to the development of its people.
Career management is therefore the operational expression of Jobs & Skills Management, since it is rooted in the major orientations in terms of know-how to be developed, working conditions, and the adaptation of skills to external developments.
Career management challenges and objectives
Tenyears ago, supporting employees in their career paths most often meant entrusting them with more responsibilities, in the form of vertical evolution. At the time, this vision depended on the organic growth of companies that have since based their development strategy more on external growth. As a result, this transition is changing the way people evolve, requiring a modern conception of careers.
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What are the challenges facing career management today?
Thechallenges of career management are to succeed in reconciling formalized career paths acting as compasses for employees, while leaving plenty of scope for the realization of unique trajectories. Moreover, these movements must also be based on reliable criteria so as to objectify evolutions and, subsequently, assess the viability of these itineraries thus created.
From the HR team's point of view, the challenge is to make all options visible, whether horizontal or cross-functional. This form of virtuous constraint encourages HR departments to design a policy that takes into account not only performance and the political dimension of individuals, but above all their skills. These then act as a link between what the company needs and what it can mobilize today and tomorrow. Finally, career planning is no longer geared solely towards the company's talents, but a more inclusive vision takes precedence, systematizing the approach to all resources.
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Objectives of efficient career management
Everyone's commitment
Symmetry of attentions is a Human Resources terminology used by Séverine Loureiro, to highlight the importance of keeping promises. Companies are finding it so difficult to recruit that there is a strong temptation to overemphasize measures that are not as satisfactory in reality. Along with the quality of management, the management of opportunities for internal mobility is the visible facet of a company's recruitment policy, where there is no room for error. At a time when 20% of probationary periods do not come to an end, we can postulate that transparency of information on internal opportunities, together with an appropriate managerial stance, will be the pillars of greater involvement.
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Enhancing your employer brand
Studies show the prevalence of flexibility, diversity of relationships and tasks in employees' expectations, alongside the salary dimension. This freedom, often seen in terms of working from home and balancing work and private life, conceals a thirst for variety in the tasks and projects available to employees.
This plurality of experience also explains the growing number of freelancers. A company stands out from the crowd when it succeeds in creating ephemeral, plural micro-companies that claim to provide solutions to specific challenges. As a result, employees who benefit from this richness will promote their structure and recommend it to their friends and family. In fact, this dimension is one of the criteria used to rate companies such as Glassdoor.
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Anticipation and performance gains
Career management requires maturity in the assessment of skills critical skills, know-how at risk and the obsolescence of certain skills. A tool such as Neobrain provides the organization with the external information it needs to steer the skills, trades to be integrated into the structure. What's more, the most fashionable skills, as well as those no longer in vogue in your company, are integrated into the HR teams' dashboard. This valuable information gives rise to a reorientation of human resources through the mechanism of Strategic Workforce Planningor "HR strategic planning". .
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Internal mobility
Our May 2023 survey of 117 HR decision-makers reveals a marked increase in requests for internal mobility, whatever the size of the company. This appetite for mobility does not only concern vertical changes, but any type of movement based on a response to an employee's desired development meets this strong expectation. This explains why we need to capitalize on both reorganizations and transformations to modify job outlines, or to go even further by structuring the company no longer on the basis of job descriptions, but of skills .
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skill at the heart of career paths
In the current state of business transformations, a professional will have, at the very least, between 4 and 5 different jobs in his or her career. The key to all these changes is the ability to renew oneself and acquire new skills skills. So, as a preamble to thinking about itinerary design, we need to assess skills reliably and on an ongoing basis.
Ongoing assessment of skills
This exercise enables the employee to become aware of his or her strengths and to take note of his or her initial level within the framework of the most relevant training schemes. A performance-measurement tool also guarantees employees lasting fulfillment in the missions entrusted to them. skills can be assessed using a number of tools:
- Self-assessment to empower employees
- Aptitude tests, particularly for skills technical or "hard skills".
- The skills assessments, which are fairly formal and often used for retraining purposes.
- 360-degree feedback , which calls on the assessment of several people and makes the above assessments reliable.
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Adapting skills
33 million euros are invested in training every year, including 15 million in vocational training. Yet survey results, such as the one conducted by Edflex with Neobrain, show moderate satisfaction among those concerned, with 2 figures to highlight:
- An average score of 6.4/10 for employee satisfaction
- 40% are unaware of their company's training offer
Even if training cannot be measured in terms of employee gratification, it remains essential to ensure that employees adhere to the company's strategic orientations. A real overhaul of training is needed today, otherwise we will no longer be able to respond to the aspirations of professionals, 26% of whom now use free channels for self-training. It is therefore becoming urgent to re-index the development offer on the skills dimension.
Getting to the bottom of the adaptation issue skills :
Here's the Replay of the Webinar with 360learning on training redesign.
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Set up a career management system
What are the steps involved in formalizing a career management system?
To build a career management system, we recommend that you follow 5 steps: design a general orientation, then audit the skills that can be mobilized, develop them if necessary, put them in motion through an intelligent tool, and finally get your talents to adhere to it.
1. Establish a career management policy
- Define the orientations and objectives of the career management policy
- Identify the skills keys to achieving corporate objectives
- Identify different career models and opportunities for professional development within the organization
2. Identify the company's skills
- Mapping skills employee profiles
- Evaluate each individual's skills and aptitudes
- Identify development and training needs to close the gaps in skills
3. Develop the necessary skills
- Set up personalized training plans for each employee
- Offer professional development opportunities such as cross-functional assignments, one-off projects or specific training courses
- Encourage continuous learning and the acquisition of new skills skills to foster career development
4. Use intelligent tools to enhance internal career opportunities
- Set up a system to monitor skills and employee performance
- Use career management tools to make internal opportunities accessible
- Use a common platform to centralize employee career information and facilitate its implementation
5. Involve the various company players and ensure their support
- Raising awareness and involving managers in the career management of their teams
- Encourage dialogue and communication between employees and HR managers
- Involve employees in planning their own careers and identifying their development needs
By following these steps, the company will be able to put in place an effective career management system, enabling employees to develop, flourish and contribute to the company's success.
Conclusion
In conclusion, career management cannot be reduced to a simple talent retention tool. It's a dynamic, evolving process that requires HR professionals to think outside the box and make bold decisions.
Today, the question arises as to whether it is still possible to offer employees clear career paths in the face of constant organizational, social and legal change.
The dream of stable careers has been undermined by restructuring, and organizational attachment has been replaced by a career attachment that leaves the employee alone in control of his or her professional destiny. So, it's no longer a question of promising medium-term career paths, but rather of making opportunities transparent - which is what the Talent Marketplace offers.
To return to the evolution of career management practices, let's take a look at today's criteria for selecting managers. It is no longer the best performers or the most expert who are entrusted with the role of developing teams, but individuals with the right skills . skill and appetence are becoming the most reliable vectors for career development.
It becomes relevant to take risks and offer opportunities to people who were not necessarily identified at the outset. It's by breaking out of conventional patterns that unexpected talents can emerge and bring real added value to the company.
In an ever-changing world, rethinking traditional models and leaving room for innovation and experimentation is particularly stimulating.
So, are you ready to think outside the box and push back the boundaries of career management?
The future is in your hands. Will you dare to seize the opportunities that present themselves?
