Employee Journey Series: Developing and Upskilling Employees

The trajectory of a person’s career growth and education is a responsibility on each individual’s shoulders. However, organizations can and should provide support, both in the form of resources and financial aid, to help their people develop their interests and passions.

However, as any HR professional knows, it’s hard to build a program that fits various employee needs and interests, let alone get a good amount of employee participation in said program.

In this post, we’ll dive deep into employee development: why it’s important, how it helps both employees and employers, how to develop a training and development program, and more. 

After reading this fourth article in the employee journey series, you’ll know everything you need to know to keep employees engaged, productive, and happy from day one until the day they decide to leave.

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What Is the Employee Journey?

The employee journey refers to the individual experience each person has at your organization, from the first time they hear about you and the interview process to their first day and their five-year anniversary. This journey can be broken down to these five stages:

1. Recruitment
2. Onboarding
3. Engagement
4. Development
5. Separation

Click the links above to learn more about the other stages of the journey—or keep reading to learn everything you need to know about developing an employee development program.

The Importance of Employee Development

Employee development not only helps employees accomplish their goals and gain confidence, but it also provides more talented people for the organization, people who have the skills and productivity needed for a competitive edge.

Here are the statistics you need to know about professional development at work:

• 94% of employees would stay at the company longer if given opportunities to learn and grow.
• 66% of younger workers rank professional development as the third-most important benefit, behind only health and disability benefits.
• Organizations with a strategy in place to develop employees have 11% greater profitability and 2X greater retention.
• 71% of employees agree that effective training and development increase job satisfaction.
• At the top workplaces in the country, 94% of employees agree that their managers help them learn and grow.
• 83% of HR professionals think upskilling will be essential for employees in the job market in the future.

Despite these impacts and benefits, 80% of people aren’t happy with the development opportunities they have at work. The disconnect between the above benefits and the level of employee dissatisfaction is something business leaders need to solve.

Designing an Employee Development Program

Creating an effective employee development program increases engagement, productivity, and creates the type of culture that attracts and retains the best talent. Here are the strategies you need to know to create such a plan.

1. Perform an In-Depth Employee Assessment

The first step is figuring out where your employees are right now. Assess their satisfaction, their level of engagement, and how they feel about their career trajectory. Try to find gaps in the company’s workflows, productivity, or quality assurance.

Use a mixture of surveys, one-on-one interviews, and performance reviews to get the clearest picture possible.

Include new hires in your assessment—do they feel confident in their responsibilities quickly, or does it take a long time for them to hit their stride? Where do employees feel they need more support? Do people have a clear view of where they can grow in their careers?

All of these questions and more are designed to help you learn more about your culture, the company’s needs, and how employees feel right now.

2. Help Employees Create a Professional Development Plan

A professional development plan (PDP) is the perfect way for employees to get all of their aspirations, goals, and plans on paper. Have managers work with their employees to develop a PDP that gives them a clear path of development in a way that’s meaningful for them.

With employee-created PDPs in hand, creating a company-wide development initiative that will speak to everyone’s specific goals and wants.

3. Set Goals That Align With Employee and Company Goals

Once you know what employees want and how they want to achieve their goals, connect their goals to the company’s goals. Where will the company be in the next five years? Ten? Which teams will expand, how many new leaders will you need?

For example, if your organization wants to open a new office in the next five years, work with managers to find employees who are interested in filling the new positions that will be required. Work with them to create professional development plans to help those employees prepare to potentially meet those position requirements.

Match up the company’s future growth and needs with employee aspirations to really show how professional development can help the company succeed.

4. Get Leadership Buy-In

Senior leaders can help push your employee development program, provide necessary funding, and even act as mentors for certain training courses. Their support is essential for the success of your program.

By getting a clear view of the company’s present needs and shortcomings, learning about employee development goals, and showing how professional development can help the company grow, you can present to leaders the importance of improving your training and development program.

5. Choose the Right Training Methods

You have to present the training and development in an engaging way for employees to jump on board, and there are many different options to choose from:

• Instructor-led courses, discussions, or Q&As
• Online training
• External development
• Social learning
• On-the-job mentoring, coaching, and shadowing

Offering multiple options is vital because while on-the-job mentoring is great for employees who want a promotion internally, those who may want to pivot in their careers may need an instructor-led course from an outside expert.

6. Implement the Program

Implementation can be an intimidating idea, and it’s no different for an employee development plan. Here are some steps to help streamline the process:

1. Find a way to market your new program—send out a calendar invite for those interested, put up signs around the office, send an email, etc.
2. Book any venues, speakers, or facilities needed.
3. Prep any facilitators, whether internal or external. Provide guides and expectations for those in charge of the training so that they understand what employees want to get out of it.
4. Share any prep work with employees so that they can show up prepared.

A great way to ensure high participation rates is with a professional development incentive. Incentivize your people to participate by rewarding them for attending, taking notes, or achieving their personal goals. Cash, gift cards, or even free food can be effective for this.

7. Evaluate Your Program’s Effectiveness

After each session, course, job shadow, etc., evaluate how things are going. Are employees enjoying the resources? Do they feel your program is helping them work toward their goals? 

After a longer time, consider testing employee skills and knowledge in the skills they’ve been learning about. This is a great way to show how your efforts will help the company.

If you find any gaps, adjust your plan to better fit employee needs.

Employee Training and Development Strategies

As mentioned above, there are many employee development methods you can offer—let’s go over some of the most common, effective, and innovative to give you an idea of your options.

On-the-Job Training

• Mentorship program. Assign the employee a senior leader as a mentor.
• Job shadowing. Allow employees to shadow a leader for a day or week to learn about their work.
• Stretch assignments. Give employees work that will help them learn new skills and knowledge.
• Cross-training. Give employees tasks that they’re not normally assigned.
• Job rotation. Systematically rotate employees from job to job in your company, allowing everyone to see different aspects of the work.
• Job enlargement. Give employees more duties and responsibility, one task at a time.

Instructor-Led Training

• In-person course. Bring in an expert to lead a training session about certain jobs or career growth opportunities.
• Virtual course. Same as above but over the computer.
• Workshops. Have an expert lead a more interactive training course.

Online Training

• Continuing education. Help employees get online degrees with resources or financial help.
• Online training modules. Offer training courses online, complete with quizzes, videos, and modules.
• Gamification. Use virtual reality, augmented reality, or simulation games to immerse employees in learning experiences that are fun.

Social Learning

• Networking opportunities. Give employees a chance to interact with others in the field they want to grow in.
• Discussion forums. Create or find forums for employees to join where they can ask questions and get more information into their interests.
• Collaborative projects. Allow employees to work together in a way that gives them opportunities for new work and a greater understanding of others’ responsibilities. 

Investing in Employee Development Is Investing in The Company’s Future

Developing a plan to help each employee learn the skills they’re interested in and grow in their own individual skill path can be a challenge. But the benefits of greater retention, greater engagement, and more skilled workers make it worth the effort.

If you want to learn more about how incentives, recognition, and rewards can help you build an employee development program, reach out to Awardco!