Employee development is an important investment for any business that wants to grow.
Investing in your employees makes them feel appreciated while developing skills that will aid your business. In contrast, the absence of staff growth can result in the inability to take up leadership roles.
This will leave your business to invest more in hiring external staff. It is not a cost-effective option if you are serious about being competitive.
Fortunately, a solid personal development plan can help mitigate these issues. It is created by a manager and employee and shows an individual’s career goals and how to achieve them.
A good development plan combines individual goals with the needs of the organization.
When done the right way, the outcomes can be rewarding. This guide will explore the essential steps needed to create a personal development plan. It will cover aspects from creating goals to measuring success.
That said, let’s begin!
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1. Evaluate your company goals
The first step to creating a strategic plan is ensuring it aligns with your company and employee goals. Here are things to note to make this happen:
Understand and align employee career goals
All employees have personal career goals. While some may want to retire early, others may aim for leadership. Make sure you have one-on-one conversations with them to determine their goals.
This will ensure you create a plan that is relevant to the individual.
Creating a development plan for an employee whose short-term goals involve opening a business will be pointless.
Next, ensure the goal aligns with your company’s goals. Let’s assume your company plans to start a car manufacturing plant soon. Having a development plan that focuses on phone repair will be pointless.
Instead, your development plan should focus on growing engineering skills. This is more in line with your future objectives.
Determine skill gaps
There are usually core areas an employee will need to develop. If you ignore these areas and focus on other less important ones, it defeats the purpose. Instead, find these areas using skills assessments, 360 feedback, or individual performance evaluation.
An employee could be lacking in time management skills or communication skills. Understanding these gaps will help you create a relevant development plan.
2. Set clear objectives and results
The next step is to develop SMART goals.
These goals are specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound. It will make it easier for you to achieve before the deadline.
Take these two goals, for instance:
- “Improve technical expertise”
- “Complete technical training using Python and write a code within 5 months.”
The first goal is not SMART since there is no measurable outcome or timeline. However, the second is SMART and offers more direction including a deadline.
Also, a goal should have a measurable outcome. Using the example above, a measurable outcome will be could be to build an application without issues.
3. Design development activities
Now that you have finished setting your goals and objectives, the next step is to set up development programs for your employees. These can consist of networking, re-education, mentorship programs, and formal training. Ideally, you’ll want to ensure each activity relates to the employee’s career goals and learning styles.
It can be efficient to set up training sessions and workshops held in-house or externally. For instance, you can fill knowledge gaps using:
- Public speaking workshops
- Leadership Training and Communication Training
These can be great ways to help employees develop. Alternatively, you can use mentorship programs. Simply pair an employee with more experienced supervisors or peers. This way, they can get a personalized learning experience, making it easier to learn. The right mentors can share industry knowledge and provide career tips using their experience.
Let’s look at some other development activities you can try out:
Stretch assignments and job rotations
Here, you assign employees tasks outside their regular responsibilities. For instance, a sales manager taking on a project that involves working with the support team. This way, they can learn new skills from the customer support department. While this may not seem useful at that moment, it will be essential to career development.
Job rotations are similar and serve the same purpose. Here, you let employees work in different departments every month or week. They learn how the department works and get new experiences. It ensures they can easily fit into any department if required – and great for those aiming for a leadership role.
Self-directed learning
Encourage employees to expand their knowledge themselves. This could be through online courses, webinars, and reading industry content. You can also provide access to online learning platforms like Udemy and Coursera. These can let employees undergo personal development at their own pace.
4. Assign deadlines and milestones
It is easy to relax when no set timeline exists to complete a personal development plan. So, you’ll want to set a deadline for achieving tasks. If a goal is a long-term one, split them into smaller, easier milestones.
For instance, your employee’s personal development plan is to get a python certification. You can set milestones for completing specific chapters or practice exams.
Next, set up a timeline for reviewing progress. To do this, you can check in with employees monthly or quarterly to gauge progress. These reviews should cover achievements, feedback, and any support they may need.
Ideally, it needs to be in a safe zone where they can open up and get the needed help.
Lastly, don’t be rigid with deadlines. Employees may have issues meeting goals for various reasons. If this happens, make sure you adjust it, but don’t change the original personal development plan.
Also, remember to communicate timeline changes with the employee to avoid issues.
5. Resources for individual development
A good personal development plan should have the proper support and resources. Not providing these affects employee performance and makes it prone to failure. Resources could come in the form of finances or access to tools.
Let’s look into both in more detail below.
Provide tools and programs
You want your employees to develop, so it is only right you offer the tools they need to succeed. Tools may range from books, online courses, and industry software. Presuming a development plan involves an employee learning to use a new coding software.
You can pay the subscription cost and give them access to the software so they can learn. This removes the extra burden of having to pay for the software.
6. Provide financial support for growth
Sometimes, an employee may need external resources to achieve development goals.
This can range from attending seminars and conferences to classes for a new certification. It can be overwhelming for employees to fund thee from their pockets. Instead cover these expenses so employees can focus on personal development.
In-house support
Support does not have to come in the form of tools or cash. Sometimes, providing employees access to hard-to reach individuals is great. These may include more experienced managers or peers who can offer clarification and guidance.
7. Monitor progress and give feedback
You’ll need to continue monitoring the personal development plan to make sure it remains on track. It is also useful for spotting changes you must implement.
There are many ways to achieve this, which we’ll cover below.
One-on-one meetings
Schedule regular meetings between employees and managers. Here, they can discuss progress and challenges. It is also an excellent way for them to get the necessary support.
Meetings don’t have to be formal and should be held in a way employees are comfortable. This way, they can offer genuine feedback which you can use to to adjust the plan in real time.
Measure performance
Monitor important metrics related to development goals. These include skills acquisition, project delivery, or increased productivity.
For instance, let’s assume your goal is to improve technical skills. A great strategy will be to assess how well the employee handles relevant tasks. If he/she does well, then it means there is progress, and you can celebrate their achievements.
Celebrate achievements
Recognize employees when they complete an important milestone in the plan. This will help motivate them to keep striving towards the goal’s completion. You can do this through formal rewards, internal announcements, and verbal praises.
Ideally, you’ll want to choose a reward strategy that aligns with individual preferences.
Constructive feedback
While this is not fun, it is an important part of a successful personal development plan. Regardless of how well you lay out a plan, some employees may fail to meet set deadlines.
If this happens, point out those areas the employee needs to improve and offer guidance as needed. Remember to celebrate success first and not focus on the negatives alone.
8. Regularly update the development plan
Employee development plans should not be set in stone and should be flexible to changing needs. Many unforeseen circumstances may require a plan to change, so staying flexible is important.
Here are ways to do this:
Fit the new direction
Your company and employee goals change over time. If this happens, you must be ready to change the employee’s personal development plan to fit the new direction.
For instance, if your organization chooses to enter new markets, you might need to incorporate it into your development plan.
The same applies to your employees. If one decides that they want to change career goals, adjust your development plan to fit this change.
Anticipate unexpected challenges
Sometimes, challenges may arise from areas you least expect. These could include
- Personal circumstances such as illnesses or death in the family
- Changes in work roles
- External pressures, including other professional development opportunities
These can disrupt the employee from completing specific professional goals.
For instance, if an employee’s work role changes, you may want to alter the plan so they don’t feel overwhelmed. It is not a good idea to enforce a development plan on an employee even when it is not convenient.
Review progress regularly
Check in with employees frequently to see how well the development plans work.
Are employees still on track? Are the goals still relevant to their needs? If not, why is this happening?
The results of these reviews will help managers adjust deadlines based on real-time progress. For instance, if an employee completes milestones faster than anticipated, speed things up.
Integrate feedback
Always request feedback from those involved in the plan. This could include employees, supervisors, and co-workers. Use the feedback to determine whether the development plan is working as it should or needs adjustment.
If an employee realizes that a learning approach isn’t working, switch things up.
9. Measure progress of performance plan
Measuring the plan’s success is a very crucial phase. It helps to determine how it affects the individual and the entire organization. Here are a few ways to properly measure the success of a development plan.
Track crucial metrics
Using measurable results is a great way to evaluate the development plan’s effectiveness. This could include business impact and improvement in employee performance. If the focus of the goal were technical skills, some measurable outcomes could include:
- Error-free tasks
- Certificate achievements
- Faster completion times
Evaluate business impact
Has the employee’s new skills added any benefits to the organization? For instance, for an employee working in the sales department, has there been a higher conversion rate or increased number of leads?
This form of evaluation will ensure that the plan benefits the business as well as the employee.
Review long term impact
Consider the positive impacts of the development plan. Has the employee started covering more tasks in the company or gotten a promotion? Or are you retaining more employees than usual?
If you measure the long-term success, you’ll find out if the development plans are effective in ensuring organizational growth.
Conclusion
Great individual development plans aren’t negotiable if you want to remain competitive. It offers a host of other benefits, including
- Higher employee satisfaction
- Better job performance
- Increased employee retention.
We’ve provided you with the key steps to apply this in your organization.
Remember that a good development plan aligns with your company and employee goals. Become one of the companies that take proactive steps to succeed. Invest in their employees by creating a development plan today!