Human capital is one of the greatest assets your company has. That is why learning and developing your employees and team members is essential. It would help if you encouraged your employees to learn new skills, nurture their career development and support their long-term professional goals.
When you make employee development a priority and give easy access to the development opportunities at your disposal, you will ensure the loyalty of your employees. According to research done in 2022 on more than 600 US businesses with 50-500 employees, 63.3% of companies report that retaining long-term employees is more challenging than hiring new ones.
In this article, we will dive into Employee development, what it is, and explore some development tactics you can use for your organization or your business.
What is Employee development?
To put it shortly, employee development is an employer's investment in their workforce. Therefore, the best way to retain talent is to nurture its development constantly. This way, the employees will develop their skills and stay longer with your company, adding more value to it.
However, you are mistaken if you think employee development means that your employee will learn new skills. It can also refer to the constant sharpening of old skills and the progression in their professional career path. This responsibility is as much of the employee as it is of the employee. Your employee needs to have the drive; you can't get in the way.
And it is an excellent cost-effective measure. For example, you spend more on training when you have a high attrition rate. It just makes more sense to put that into programs encouraging your employee's growth.
Employee development Tactics
Personalize the path
First of you need to make individual development plans. This means you need to work with every employee individually. Have a team of professionals on standby if you have to; try to make it as personal as possible. Make clear and realistic monthly or even weekly goals and align them as closely as possible with your company's or project ones.
Go for the gold from the get-go
Management should start with employee development as soon as onboarding does. Starting immediately shows your employees that you want them to stay in the company for a long time.
Offer continuous and judgment-free feedback
Don't just offer feedback as an excuse to criticize someone's work or progress. Instead, use feedback as a way of pointing out the flaws in the way that your employee is learning. Also, don't forget to offer positive reinforcement as well.
Please don't be stingy when it comes to money
To see actual returns on any investment, you need to spend money on the right tools. Unfortunately, things like employee monitoring tools don't come for free. Although not everything has to cost money, many resources are available online that can even benefit the leadership skills of your upper management. The only drawback with relying too much on online resources is that there is inevitably a lot of garbage, which will do little to develop your talent. Instead, have a coach, which brings us to our next point.
Hire a coach
If you want a try a proven method of teaching someone, it is to hire a coach to do it personally. A coach can be someone with seniority within the company, or you can have an outside hire. The important thing is that they possess the proper knowledge for the job. A coach can either make a learning and development training program or work closely with your employees, encouraging them to do better. Assess what works best for you.
Expand Your Network
Encourage your employees to network within your industry. Introduce your employees to other notable managers or business leaders in your industry. This way, they will gain fresh insights and solve their workplace challenges in a new way. Employees may even become sort of emissaries of your business this way.
Work on Retention
The best way to retain your employees is to keep engagement up and reward them as often as possible. We wrote a whole article on employee retention and why the attrition rate is essential for your company's health. But to sum it up, it is more expensive to train a new employee than to reward an existing one.
A few Benefits of Employee Development programs
- You will improve your internal performance and remain competitive in your field.
- Gain new ideas or insights on existing methods or products.
- Have a workforce that's focused on the internal process of your company
- Everything is in flux in the business world, but if you have employees and employers looking for opportunities, you will be better equipped to handle surprises.
- Foster a company culture that nurtures learning, offers courses and resources, and invests in the future of the workforce, and you will attract new workers constantly within the industry.
- Improve your employee's morale and have better engagement with fresh ideas.
- Be flexible and expand with ease.
- Workforce retention
Conclusion
The important thing here is that you aren't the barrier to the learning and development of your employees. If they want to excel in their position, you should encourage them to do so. This way, you will have a loyal and grateful workforce too. Be a shining example to all the professionals and companies in your field.