The importance of supporting employee career development

Posted 3 years ago

We live in a day and age where businesses and their management teams are left to juggle a number of new expectations on top of many traditional challenges. Many of these expectations have come as a result of the pandemic, leaving some employees demanding more from their employers. Fortunately, with the right attitude and flexibility, business leaders and other managers should find these expectations manageable.

One trend amongst recent generations of workers is the expectation of support from their employers when it comes to achieving their personal and professional goals. Whether they’re looking to immediately expand their horizons, perhaps in a new role, or if they are looking to build towards a different long-term goal, it is in the employer’s best interest to help them achieve this.

Offering support to employees looking to develop will enable them to find the best version of themselves and will help them find more value in the context of their work.

Although many employers already offer great support to their employees when it comes to developing their careers, what many employers may not have considered are the business benefits they receive as a result of this support.

The business benefits of supporting employee career development

There are a number of obvious reasons why supporting an employee’s career development is beneficial to them, including:

Helping them to achieve their career goals
Providing them with greater motivation to learn
Boosting their confidence

Employers themselves also have much to gain from supporting employees with their career development, including…

Building commitment and engagement
Discovering hidden potential
The business develops skills for the future
Helping to attract new talent

Now that we’ve taken a brief look at the benefits of supporting employee career development, let’s look at how employers can effectively support employee career development.

How businesses can better support employee career development

It’s clear to see that supporting an employee’s career development is in a business’ best interest. Fortunately, there are several ways that employers can offer support!

Offer staff regular feedback

Offering staff regular feedback is a fantastic way to help them work towards developing their career. Through use of constructive criticism and praise, you can guide them into the direction of success.

Offering support to employees in this way can be made more effective through the use of a more structured approach. For example, having one-to-one meetings with employees every so often gives them an opportunity to ask questions and focus the feedback on a certain area of their work.

Provide growth opportunities

Firstly, employers should always try and keep an understanding of what their employees want to achieve from their work. This can be achieved by asking a few simple questions during their appraisals or other one-to-one meetings.

Employers can also go one step further and look to provide their employees with opportunities to grow within the workplace.

Offering growth opportunities at work enables employees to leave their comfort zone and take on different responsibilities. Additionally, it can help the employee feel more valued, which in turn will provide them with the motivation they need to further their skills.

Good growth opportunities will provide employees with the chance to take risks they may not have taken otherwise, which will ultimately accelerate their progress towards their goals.

Support a healthy work-life balance

As mentioned in our blog on how upskilling can help businesses combat the ‘Great Resignation’, the COVID-19 pandemic has led to a huge volume of workers leaving their jobs in order to seek a more flexible role as they begin to rethink their priorities.

Although most employers are generally aware of the benefits of a healthy work-life balance, many aren’t aware of how a healthy work-life balance may help an employee’s career development.

We generally consider hard work as a prerequisite for career success, but times have changed and employees shouldn’t need to commit countless extra hours to their workdays. Instead, employees should be encouraged to work more efficiently during their contracted hours. This can be achieved very easily through skills relating to productivity like time management.

As a result of a healthy work-life balance, individuals can find more time to work on personal development whilst subconsciously building on skills like Time Management, Critical Thinking, and Problem Solving.

Training

The final, and perhaps most important step in supporting an employee’s career development is providing them with effective training. In fact, there are a number of reasons that we believe effective workplace training in 2022 will be more important than ever before!

There are many different types of training that could be offered to employees to further their careers, and it’s down to employers to gain an understanding of what is effective for each individual. However, one of the most popular methods of training delivery used by organisations today is eLearning.

Using eLearning, through a quality training provider, is extremely effective for career development and it has a number of benefits over other traditional forms of training delivery. This includes the ability for a user to replay the course and refer back to certain areas, end-of-training tests to ensure that all the relevant information has been absorbed, and engaging animations to make the courses more memorable.

Here at iHasco, we offer a wide range of eLearning courses, covering a number of areas including:

Our presenter-lead short online training courses are perfect for delivering key information in an effective and memorable way.

To see the quality of our courses for yourself, simply claim your free trial using the form below!