EMPLOYEE DEVELOPMENT TAKES ON

In 2013, employers need to lay more emphasis on employee development than ever before
Employee development is one of the highlyprioritised aims for organizations. Employees make up for the most vital assets of an organisation and their satisfaction as well as engagement are essential for high productivity. a wholesome growth, both in a professional's career and personality.

Let us explore how companies are planning the same in 2013.

Kamal Karanth, MD, Kelly Services India says Although employee training and employee development are similar in the methods used to foster learning, their time-frames differ. Training is more present-day oriented; its focus is on individuals' current jobs, thus enhancing those specific skills and abilities to immediately perform their jobs. Employee development, generally focuses on future jobs in the organization. As your job and career progress, new skills and abilities will be required. As you are groomed for positions of greater responsibility, employee development efforts can help prepare you for that day."

 Rajesh Rai, director- HR, Expedia India, tells us "Business challenges have been growing multi-fold and today, the office environment offers a myriad set of unique and complex challenges due to the fluctuation in the economy. there is more emphasis on adding business value to get the requisite return on investments. To prepare employees for these challenges, proactive development is the key and hence, its increased importance today is gaining a lot of prominence

 Meenal Sinha, country head - India, Imperial Servcorp says "It cannot only mean sending employees for workshops and seminars it's not a responsibility that can be simply outsourced'. Grooming people for enhanced responsibilities and the next-level has to become a culture-inherent process. A senior manager's KRA must include team training and development, not only in structured environments, but also on an ongoing day-to-day basis. This needs to be coupled with the freedom to explore new areas and some latitude to make decisions, with the assurance that learning mistakes' are tolerated.

 Kamal Meattle, CEO, Paharpur Business Centre & Software Technology Incubator Park, tells us "Encouraging employees to acquire new or advanced skills and knowledge by providing them with training facilities and avenues where such new ideas can be applied can be very beneficial for engagement. Training programmes allow employees to interact with one another, discuss ideas and learn more about a given topic, which encourages active participation on-the-job outside of the training environment as well. Their increased productivity leads to financial gains and better retention."

What Is Employee Development?

a joint, on going effort on the part of an employee and the organization upgrade the employee's knowledge, skills, and abilities. balance between an individual's career needs and goals and the organization's need to get work done. positive contributions to organizational performance. A more highly-skilled workforce can accomplish more as employees gain in experience and knowledge.

 A more highly skilled workforce can accomplish more as the individuals gain in experience and knowledge. In addition, retaining an employee saves the organization a great deal of money. One method of retention is to provide opportunities to develop new skills. In research conducted to assess what retained employees, development was one of the top three retention items.

Why Should Employee Skills and Abilities Be Developed?

Employee development is a necessary component of a companys efforts to:

Improve quality Retain key employees Meet the challenges of global competition and social change. Incorporate technological advances and changes in work design.

Comparison Between Training and Development.

Approaches to Employee Development

Assessment

Formal Education Job Experiences Interpersonal Relationships

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Formal Education
Formal education programs include:

off-site and on-site programs designed specifically for the companys employees short courses offered by consultants or universities executive MBA programs university programs in which participants actually live at the university while taking classes
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Assessment
Assessment involves collecting information and providing feedback to employees about their behavior, communication style, or skills. Used most frequently to:

identify employees with managerial potential measure current managers strengths and weaknesses identify managers with potential to move into higher-level executive positions Work with teams to identify members strengths and weaknesses, and factors that inhibit productivity
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Job Experiences
Job experiences refer to relationships, problems, demands, tasks, or other features that employees face in their jobs. Most employee development occurs through job experiences. A major assumption is that development is most likely to occur when there is a mismatch between the employees skills and past experiences and the skills required for the job.

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How Job Experiences are Used for Employee Development

Promotion

Enlargement of Current Job Rotation

(Lateral Move)

Transfer
(Lateral Move)

Job Experiences

Externship

Downward Move

Temporary Assignment with Another Organizatio 9 - 15 n

Interpersonal Relationships
Employees can also develop skills and increase their knowledge about the company and its customers by interacting with a more experienced organizational member. Two types of interpersonal relationships used to develop employees:
Mentoring Coaching

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There are a few basic roles for a supervisor in developing employees.

Coaching employees to help them determine what they need for development Providing both positive and corrective feedback Offering organizational insight, information, and advice. Guiding the planning through goal setting and checking back over time Allotting time and money for development experiences. Ensuring opportunities for applications of new learning.

Some things the employee should have and consider when beginning work towards development:
Specific goals; identify goals for new skills and look for ways to meet those goals Energy to make the development possible A variety of work assignments Asking for feedback Opportunities to coach others and finding good coaches for him or herself Developmental relationships that provide a variety of learning