When I talk about Career Management or Career Pathing I often hear the objections:
- We don’t want to put people into boxes
- Our people are more “free thinking”, they create their own careers
- We don’t want to disrupt the motivation and culture of the organisation.
This is quite correct – IF we think that Career Pathing today is the same as the traditional concept of Career Pathing. It’s NOT!!
Truthfully, intentionally or not, we are still offering “traditional” careers!
Traditional Career Pathing
Traditional Career Pathing is an artefact of the era when one was expected to sign onto an organisation at age 21, follow the rules, get promoted incrementally over time, and retire with a gold watch at age 60. The term “Career Ladder” described the progression from “entry level” positions to higher levels of skill, responsibility, or authority and, of course, pay! A Career Ladder generally meant upward mobility within a promotion model. Because the ladder did not provide for lateral movement, it was assumed to be a singular track with the greatest benefits at the top.
Career Pathing Today – The Spiral Model
The Spiral Career Path allows the employee to make a series of lateral moves between different Job Families (functional areas) within a Career Cluster within the same organisation. It enables management to retain talent by continuously challenging employees with new tasks and broadening their experience while at the same time managing and controlling hierarchical progress. Spiral Career Pathing is much more appropriate for today’s flattened organisations that offer limited upward opportunities.
The benefits of Spiral Career Pathing
Benefits to Employers
Spiral Career Pathing enables employer organisations to:
- Put better strategies in place to retain key and core talent
- Provide broad experience for high potential and high performing employees
- Grow employees both laterally and vertically, not necessarily at the same time.
- Grow managers and leaders with broad experience of the organisation as a whole
- “Flex” the career positions as and when needed by organisation strategy.
Benefits to Employees
For employees, Spiral Career Pathing enables them to:
- Grow more skills and broader experience of the business environment.
- Experience different careers in the organisation and decide which is right for them at the time.
- Move to different careers and not limit to a single hierarchical structure
- Have a flexible approach to growing their careers
- Take charge of their own career
- Explore opportunities without the stress of moving to different organisations.
IT Career Development Framework
The IITPSA’s (Institute of IT Professionals SA – the SAQA recognised Professional Body for IT in SA) IT Career Development Framework is a complete framework of jobs and competencies across all levels of job and Job Families in IT. To learn more about the IT Career Development Framework, click here.
Is YOUR Organisation ready for Spiral Career Pathing?
If you organisation is ready for Spiral Career Pathing, call us now. We can help you to define and implement a Spiral Career Path for your organisation.