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CHAPTER 9
DEVELOPING EMPLOYEES FOR FUTURE SUCCESS
Chapter Summary
This chapter explores the purpose and activities of employee development. The chapter begins by discussing the relationships among development, training, and career management. Next, it looks at development approaches, including formal education, assessment, job experiences, and interpersonal relationships. The chapter emphasizes the types of skills, knowledge, and behaviors that are strengthened by each development method, so employees and their managers can choose appropriate methods when planning development. The third section of the chapter describes the steps of the career management process, emphasizing the responsibilities of employee and employer at each step of the process. The chapter concludes with a discussion of special challenges related to employee development – the so-called glass ceiling, succession planning, and dysfunctional managers.
Learning Objectives
After studying this chapter, the student should be able to:
Discuss how development is related to training and careers.
Identify the methods organizations use for employee development.
Describe how organizations use assessment of personality type, work behaviors, and job performance to plan employee development.
Explain how job experiences can be used for developing skills.
Summarize principles for setting up successful mentoring programs.
Tell how managers and peers develop employees through coaching.
Identify the steps in the process of career management.
Discuss how organizations are meeting the challenge of the “glass ceiling”, succession planning, and dysfunctional managers.
Extended Chapter Outline
Note: Key terms are boldface and are listed in the “Chapter Vocabulary” section.
I. Introduction
Employee development is the combination of formal education, job experience, relationships, and assessment of personality and abilities to help employees prepare for the future of their careers.
Human resource management establishes a process for employee development that prepares employees to help the organization meet its goals.
II. Training, Development, and Career Management
1. Organizations and their employees must constantly expand their knowledge, skills, and behaviors to meet customer needs and compete in today’s demanding and rapidly changing business environment.
Development and Training
1. The definition of development indicates that it is future oriented. It involves learning that is not necessarily related to the employee’s current job.
2. Development prepares employees for other positions in the organization and increases their ability to move into jobs that may not yet exist.
3. Development may help employees prepare for changes in their current jobs such as changes resulting from new technology, work designs, or customers.
4. Training traditionally focuses on helping employees improve performance of their current jobs.
5. Table summarizes the traditional differences between training and development.
B. Development for Careers
In the traditional view, a career consists of a sequence of positions within an occupation or organization.
The new concept of a career is often referred to as a protean career – that is, a career that frequently changes based on changes in the person’s interests, abilities, and values and in the work environment.
The traditional career requires “knowing how” or having the appropriate skills and knowledge to provide a particular service or product.
A protean career also requires that employees “know why” and “know whom.” Knowing why means understanding the employer’s business and culture in order to apply knowledge and skills in a way that contributes to the business. Knowing whom means developing relationships that contribute to the employee’s success.
As organizations provide for employee development and as employees take control of their own careers, they will need a pair of opportunities.
a. Employees will need to determine their interests, skills, and weaknesses
b. Employees will seek development experiences that will likely involve jobs and relationships as well as formal courses
Career management helps employees select development activities that prepare them to meet their career goals. It helps employers select development activities in line with its human resource needs.
III. Approaches to Employee Development
Employee development often focuses on managers, but development is useful for all levels of employees.
The many approaches to employee development fall into four broad categories: formal education, assessment, job experiences, and interpersonal relationships. Figure summarizes these four methods.
A. Formal Education
Organizations may support employee development through a variety of formal educational programs either at the workplace or offsite.
2. These formal education programs may include the following:
Workshops
Short courses offered by consultants or universities
University programs offered to employees who live on campus during the program
Executive MBA programs
B. Assessment
Assessment is collecting information and providing feedback to employees about their behavior, communication style, or skills.
Information for assessment may come from the employees, their peers, managers, and customers.
The most frequent uses of assessment are to identify employees with managerial potential and to measure current managers’ strengths and weaknesses. Organizations also use assessment to identify managers with potential to move into higher-level executive positions.
For assessment to support development, the information must be shared with the employee being assessed.
Organizations vary in the methods and sources of information they use in developmental assessment. These methods include: performance appraisals, psychological tests, and collecting ratings of behaviors and style of working with others.
The tools used for these assessment methods include the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, assessment centers, the Benchmarks assessment, performance appraisal, and 360-degree feedback.
Myers-Briggs Type Indicator: The most popular psychological test for employee development is the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI). The test results describe individuals’ preferences in four areas:
a. The energy dimension – indicates where individuals gain their interpersonal strength and vitality, measured as their degree of introversion (I) or extroversion (E)
b. The information-gathering preference – relates to the actions individuals take when making decisions – Sensing (S) and intuitives (N) are the types
c. Amount of consideration for others – Thinking (T), and feeling (F) are the two types
d. The lifestyle preference – describes an individual’s tendency to be either flexible or structured – Judging (J) and perceiving (P) are the two types
Table summarizes the personality types found on the MBTI.
As a result of using the four preferences indicated by the MBTI results, each person develops strengths and weaknesses.
Applying this kind of information about employees’ preferences helps organizations understand the communication, motivation, teamwork, work styles, and leadership of the people in their groups.
For team development, the MBTI can help teams match team members with assignments that match their preferences and can improve problem solving.
Research on the validity, reliability, and effectiveness of the MBTI is inconclusive.
The MBTI is not appropriate for measuring job performance or as the only means of evaluating promotion potential.
Assessment Centers: At an assessment center, multiple raters or evaluators evaluate employees’ performance on a number of exercises. An assessment center is usually an off-site location such as a conference center. The primary use of assessment centers is to identify whether employees have the personality characteristics, administrative skills, and interpersonal skills needed for managerial jobs. Organizations also use them to determine whether employees have the skills needed for working in teams.
The types of exercises used in assessment centers include:
a. Leaderless group discussion – a team of 5 to 7 employees is assigned a problem and must work together to solve it within a certain time period
b. Interviews – questions typically cover each employee’s work and personal experiences, skill strengths and weaknesses, and career plans
c. In-basket exercises – simulate the administrative tasks of a manager’s job, using a pile of documents for the employee to handle
d. Role plays – participants take the part of a manger or employee in a situation involving skills to be assessed
Other exercises in assessment centers might include interest and aptitude tests and personality tests.
The assessors in the centers are usually managers who have been trained to look for employee behaviors that are related to the skills being assessed.
Research suggests that assessment center ratings are valid for predicting performance, salary level, and career advancement. Assessment centers may also be useful for development because of the feedback that participants receive about their attitudes and skill strengths and weaknesses.
Benchmarks: A development method that focuses on measuring management skills is an instrument titled Benchmarks. This measurement tool gathers ratings of a manager’s use of skills associated with success in managing.
Table identifies 16 skills and perspectives of managers.
Performance Appraisals and 360-Degree Feedback: Performance appraisal is the process of measuring employees’ performance. This information can be useful for employee development under certain conditions. 360-degree feedback performance measurement is a recent trend in performance appraisals.
There are several benefits of 360-degree feedback such as collecting multiple perspectives and establishing formal communications about behaviors and skill ratings between employees and their external customers.
This method is most likely to be effective if the rating instrument enables reliable or consistent ratings, assesses the behaviors or skills that are job related, and is easy to use.
Potential limitations of 360-degree feedback include: it demands a significant amount of time, a facilitator is needed to interpret results, and simply delivering ratings does not provide ways for managers to act on the feedback.
C. Job Experiences
Most employee development occurs through job experiences. These are the contribution of relationships, problems, demands, tasks, and other features of an employee’s job.
Most of what we know about development through job experiences comes from a series of studies conducted by the Center for Creative Leadership.
The impact of using demanding job experiences for employee development varies, depending on whether the employees view the experience as positive or negative sources of stress. With positive stressors, the employees view the experiences as challenging and are stimulated to learn. With negative stressors, the employees view the experiences as stressful.
Organizations may use job experiences to develop skills needed for teamwork including conflict resolution, data analysis, and customer service.
Various job assignments can provide for employee development. The organization may enlarge the employee’s current job or move the employee to different jobs. Lateral moves include job rotation, transfer, or temporary assignments to another organization. The organization may also use downward moves or promotions as a source of job experience. Figure summarizes these alternatives.
Job Enlargement: Job enlargement involves adding challenges or new responsibilities to employees’ current jobs. Job enlargement not only makes a job more interesting, but it also creates an opportunity for employees to develop new skills.
Job Rotation: Job rotation is moving employees through a series of job assignments in one or more functional areas. Job rotation helps employees gain an appreciation for the company’s goals, increases their understanding of different functions, develops a network of contacts, improves problem-solving and decision-making skills, and helps employees increase their salary and earn promotion faster.
Job rotation poses some problems for employees and the organization. It may give employees a short-term perspective on problems and their solutions, may make employees feel less satisfied and motivated, and may hurt productivity.
Job rotation is most likely to succeed when it meets certain conditions:
a. Job rotation is used for developing skills as well as gaining experience for management careers.
b. Employees understand specifically what skills rotation is to develop.
c. The organization uses job rotation for all levels and types of employees.
d. Job rotation is linked with the career management process so employees know what development needs each assignment addresses.
e. The organization manages the timing of rotations to maximize their benefits and minimize their costs.
f. All employees have equal opportunities for job rotation, regardless of their demographic group.
Transfers, Promotions, and Downward Moves: In a transfer, the organization assigns an employee to a position in a different area of the company. Transfers do not necessarily increase job responsibilities or compensation. They are usually lateral moves. Transfers may involve relocation to another part of the country or even to another country.
A downward move occurs when an employee is given less responsibility and authority. The temporary cross-functional move is the most common way to use downward moves for employee development.
A promotion involves moving an employee into a position with greater challenges, more responsibility, and more authority than in the previous job. Usually promotions include pay increases.
Temporary Assignments with Other Organizations: Externship is a full-time, temporary position at another organization. Temporary assignments can include a sabbatical, which is a leave of absence from an organization to renew or develop skills. Employees on sabbatical often receive full pay and benefits.
D. Interpersonal Relationships
Two types of relationships used for employee development are mentoring and coaching.
Mentors: A mentor is an experienced, productive senior employee who helps develop a less experienced employee called the protégé.
Mentoring programs tend to be most successful when they are voluntary and participants understand the details of the program.
Mentors and protégés can both benefit from a mentoring relationship. Protégés receive career support and the benefits of a positive relationship. Managers get the chance to develop their interpersonal skills and increase their feelings that they are contributing something important to the organization.
Coaching: A coach is a peer or manager who works with an employee to motivate the employee, help him or her develop skills, and provide reinforcement and feedback. Coaches may play one or more of three roles:
Working one-on-one with an employee, as when giving feedback
b. Helping employees learn for themselves
c. Providing resources such as mentors, courses, or job experiences
IV. Systems for Career Management
1. Employee development is most likely to meet the organization’s needs if it is part of a human resource system of career management.
2. A basic career management system involves four steps: self-assessment, reality check, goal setting, and action planning.
3. Figure , Steps and Responsibilities in the Career Management Process, identifies the four steps of a basic career management process.
A. Self Assessment
The first stage of career development is self-assessment. This is the use of information by employees to determine their career interests, values, aptitudes, and behavioral tendencies.
Self-assessment tools include: psychological tests such as the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, the Strong-Campbell Interest Inventory, and the Self-Directed Search.
Figure , Sample Self-Assessment Exercise, is an example of a self-assessment tool.
B. Reality Check
In the next step of career management, the reality check – employees receive information about their skills and knowledge and where these assets fit into the organization’s plans.
Usually the employer conducts the reality check as part of a performance appraisal or as the feedback stage of performance management.
C. Goal Setting
Based on the information from the self-assessment and reality check, the employee sets short- and long-term career objectives. These goals usually involve one or more of the following categories:
a. Desired positions
b. Level of skill to apply
c. Work setting
d. Skill acquisition
D. Action Planning
During the final step, employees prepare an action plan for how they will achieve their short- and long-term career goals.
Action plans may involve any one or combination of development methods. The approach used depends on the developmental needs and career objectives.
The outcome of action planning often takes the form of a career development plan. Figure , Career Development Plan, is an example of a development plan for a product manager.
V. Development-Related Challenges
Glass ceiling refers to an invisible barrier that keeps women and minorities from reaching the top jobs.
Organizations can use development systems to help break the glass ceiling.
A. Succession Planning
1. Succession planning is the process of identifying and tracking high-potential employees who will be able to fill top management positions when they become vacant.
2. Succession planning offers several benefits such as: (1) it forces senior management to regularly and thoughtfully review the company’s leadership talent, (2) it assures that top-level management talent is available, (3) it provides a set of development experiences that managers must complete to be considered for top management positions, and (4) it helps attract and retain ambitious managerial employees by providing development opportunities.
3. Succession planning focuses on high-potential employees, that is, employees the organization believes can succeed in higher-level business positions.
4. Based on research, an effective program for developing high-potential employees has three stages. These include:
a. Selection of high-potential employees
b. Developmental experience
c. Active involvement with the CEO
B. Dysfunctional Managers
1. A manager who is otherwise competent may engage in some behaviors that make the manager ineffective or even “toxic” – someone who stifles good ideas and drives away employees.
2. Dysfunctional behaviors include: insensitivity to others, inability to be a team player, arrogance, poor conflict management skills, inability to meet business objectives, and inability to adapt to change. Figure is a humorous look at dysfunctional managers.
3. When a manager is an otherwise valuable employee and is willing to improve, the organization may try to help the manager change the dysfunctional behavior. The usual ways to provide for this type of development includes: assessment, training, and counseling. The organization may enroll the manager in a program specifically designed to help managers with dysfunctional behavior, such as the Individual Coaching for Effectiveness (ICE) program. The effectiveness of this kind of program has not yet been thoroughly studied. Research suggests that managers who participate in such programs improve their skills and are less likely to be terminated. This suggests that organizations can benefit from offering development opportunities to valuable employees with performance problems, not just star performers.
Chapter Vocabulary
Employee Development
Protean Career
Assessment
Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI)
Assessment Center
Leaderless Group Discussion
Benchmarks
Job Experiences
Transfer
Downward Move
Promotion
Externship
Sabbatical
Mentor
Coach
Self-Assessment
Reality Check
Glass Ceiling
Succession Planning
Review and Discussion Questions
1. How does development differ from training? How does development support career management in modern organizations?
Development refers to formal education, job experiences, relationships, and assessment of personality and abilities that help employees prepare for the future. It is future oriented. Development involves learning that is not necessarily related to the employee’s current job. Training traditionally focuses on helping employees improve performance of their current jobs.
Career management helps employees select development activities that prepare them to meet their career goals. It is through development that employees can proceed forward in their chosen career paths.
2. What are the four broad categories of development methods? Why might it be beneficial to combine all of these methods into a formal development program?
The four broad categories of development methods are: formal education, assessment, job experiences, and interpersonal relationships. All of these methods can influence and impact the development of employees. Utilizing of all the methods in a formal development program would be indicative of providing employees with the best development possible.
3. Recommend a development method for each of the following situations and explain why you chose that method.
a. An employee recently promoted to the job of plant supervisor is having difficulty motivating employees to meet quality standards.
b. A sales manager annoys salespeople by dictating every detail of their work.
c. An employee has excellent leadership skills but lacks knowledge of the financial side of business.
d. An organization is planning to organize its production workers into teams for the first time.
The responses provided will reflect the opinions of each individual student. Each response provided should be adequately supported and rationalized with text material.
4. A company that markets sophisticated business management software systems uses sales teams to help customers define needs and to create systems that meet those needs. The teams include programmers, salespeople who specialize in client industries, and software designers. Occasionally sales are lost as a result of conflict or communication problems among team members. The company wants to improve the effectiveness of these teams and it wants to begin with assessment. How can the teams use 360-degree feedback and psychological tests to develop?
The responses provided to this question by the individual students will vary. However, all responses provided to this question should demonstrate a clear understanding of the chapter material and its concepts.
Suggested responses could include: 360-degree feedback provides feedback from a variety of individuals, so the team members would be receiving individual feedback from various sources and thus, would be able to correct or amend any deficiencies found. Psychological tests would provide profiles of the various team members, so compatible team members could be placed together.
5. In an organization that wants to use work experience as a method of employee development, what basic options are available? Which of these options would be most attractive to you as an employee? Why?
Most employee development does occur through job experiences. Job experiences contribute to development through a combination of relationships, problems, demands, tasks, and other features of an employee’s jobs. Options that would be available to promote this form of employee development could include: job enlargement, job rotation, transfers, promotions, downward moves, and temporary assignments with other organizations.
The individual students will select what option they would find the most attractive.
6. Many employees are unwilling to relocate because they like their current community and family members prefer not to move. Yet preparation for management requires that employees develop new skills, strengthen areas of weakness, and be exposed to new aspects of the organization’s business. How can an organization change an employee’s current job to develop management skills?
Various job assignments can provide for employee development. The organization can enlarge the employee’s current job or move the employee to different jobs. Offering temporary assignments at another organization or utilizing downward moves and promotions could also serve as sources for employee development. Also, the current employees could be sent to workshops updating them on various management skills where they have to interact and participate to gain a feeling for the different management skills when in practice.
7. Many people feel that mentoring relationships should occur naturally, in situations where senior managers feel inclined to play the role. What are some advantages of setting up a formal mentoring program, rather than letting senor managers decide how and whom to help?
Advantages of establishing formal mentoring programs include: access to mentors for all employees, regardless of gender or race and the participants know what to expect and what is expected of them.
8. What are the three roles of a coach? How is each coach different from a mentor? What are some advantages of using someone outside the organization as a coach? Some disadvantages?
The three roles of a coach include: working one-on-one with an employee, helping employees learn for themselves, and providing resources such as mentors, courses, or job experiences.
A coach is a peer or manager who works with an employee to motivate the employee, help him or her develop skills, and provide reinforcement and feedback. A mentor is an experienced, productive senior employee who helps develop a less experienced employee.
Advantages of using someone from outside the organization as a coach would include: the advent of new ideas and perspectives and offering new methods for completing assignments. Some disadvantages of using someone from outside the organization as a coach would include: organizational culture and values would not be known to this person and work habits may not be acceptable to the organization.
9. Why should organizations be interested in helping employees plan their careers? What benefits can companies gain? What are the risks?
Organizations should be interested in helping employees plan their careers to let the employee know how much they are valued and exactly what the organization has to offer them after they have progressed in their field.
This question could be used as a brainstorming exercise in which students try to think of as many benefits as they can. Some benefits would include improved employee morale if employees feel that the company cares about their careers, better career planning for the company, a better fit with the company and the employees, and so on. .
10. What are the manager’s roles in a career management system? Which role do you think is most difficult for the typical manager? Which is the easiest role? List reasons why managers might resist becoming involved in career management.
The manager’s roles in a career management system include self-assessment, reality check, goal setting, and action planning. In self-assessment, managers provide assessment information to identify strengths, weaknesses, interests, and values. In the reality check role, managers communicate performance evaluation to show where the employee fits into the long range plans of the company. In the goal-setting role, managers ensure that the goal is specific, challenging, and attainable as well as committing to help the employees reach the goal. In the action planning role, managers identify resources employees need to reach their goals including courses, work experience, and relationships.
The most difficult role is the reality check. Here the managers have to communicate with their employees about their performance and evaluations. This may be very hard for some managers as not many are comfortable with commenting on employees’ progress because they do not want to create conflict. The easiest role for managers is the goal setting because almost every manager has an idea on what the goals for the company are to be and in this role they have to make those goals clear and attainable to the employee.
Managers may resist involvement in the management career program because they may not feel comfortable with such a structured program. Many managers are not comfortable being involved in all the steps of career management.
11. What is the glass ceiling? What are the possible consequences to an organization that has a glass ceiling? How can employee development break the glass ceiling? Can succession planning help with this problem? Explain.
The glass ceiling is an invisible barrier that keeps women and minorities from the organization’s top jobs. Organizations that have a glass ceiling face lawsuits and legal difficulties. Development programs can ensure that these employees receive access to developmental resources such as coaches, mentors, and developmental job assignments. Succession planning ensures that the organization prepares qualified employees to fill management jobs as manages retire. Without the threat of a glass ceiling, women and minorities have an equal chance for such vacant positions.
12. Why might an organization benefit from giving employee development opportunities to a dysfunctional manager rather than simply dismissing the manager? Do these reasons apply to nonmanagement employees as well?
For dysfunctional managers who have the potential to contribute to the organization, the organization may offer development targeted at correcting the areas of dysfunction. The organization stands to gain a devoted and dedicated employee versus a terminated one. These same reasons would also apply to nonmanagement employees as well.
Business Week Case: Basic Training for CEOs
Case Summary:
This case study explores the approach to new CEO development known as “boot camp for recently appointed CEOs.”
Questions:
1. This chapter focused on employee development as a way to prepare for jobs with greater responsibility. Why would someone who has already gained an organization’s top job (chief executive officer) want to participate in employee development activities such as the CEO Academy?
Student responses to this question will vary. However, information from both the text and the case study should be referenced. Suggested responses may include: to maintain and enhance current skills and build new skills and abilities in order to remain at the top. Also it serves as a role modeling—lead by example.
2. What development methods does the CEO Academy use? Can you suggest any other methods that would help a CEO become more effective?
Suggested responses could include formal education, assessment, team building/survival exercises/training, job experiences, and interpersonal relationships.
3. A chief executive would not be able to turn to higher-level managers at the organization to serve as the CEOs mentor or coach. Who might coach or mentor a CEO or other high-level manager?
Possible responses would be for the mentor or coach to come from an outside organization where the person holds a similar high-level position, board of directors, chairman of the board, former CEOs and high level managers from the organizations, etc.
End of Chapter Case:
Case Summary: Developing Employees Reduces Risk for First USA Bank
This case scenario examines the methods utilized by First USA to better satisfy and develop their employees thus decreasing turnover within the organization.
Questions:
1. What benefits does the Opportunity Knocks program offer to employees? To First USA?
The program provides career development opportunities for employees. To accomplish this, the program offers job enlargement, lateral moves, etc. First USA will benefit by retaining these better-satisfied and productive employees.
2. Suggest some ways that First USA could enhance this program with other employee development activities.
The responses will vary. The responses provided should demonstrate adequate understanding of the concepts and be supported by chapter and case information.
3. What if the Opportunity Knocks program leads some employees to decide they should leave the company to pursue their career objectives elsewhere? Does that make the program unwise? How might First USA address this risk?
The responses provided by the students will vary. However, responses should demonstrate understanding of the chapter and case study concepts. Suggested responses may include that this is a possible consequence, much like if the employee left the organization due to dissatisfaction. This does not indicate that the program is unwise; this is just a consequence of a known risk factor. First USA could address this risk by providing rewards that offer satisfaction to the employees.
