Since the COVID-19 pandemic, the UK job market has seen dramatic shifts, with significant candidate shortages and increased competition for talent.
Approximately 4 million Brits have switched career paths, while a dwindling work-age population, declining birth rates and a record high of 2.8 million ‘economically inactive’ individuals add to the pressure to an already competitive job market.
In such a challenging environment, one key strategy stands out: investing in career development.
Not only do career development initiatives improve employee satisfaction, but they are essential for long-term retention and business growth.
In this article, we explore the vital role that career development plays in enhancing employee satisfaction and the steps employers can take to implement effective learning and development programs.
What is career development and why is it important?
The Career Development Institute defines career development as “the lifelong process of managing and advancing your career over time”.
Essentially the practice involves furthering learning and development to acquire new skills, knowledge and experiences, and making strategic decisions to enhance professional growth and achieve career goals.
Learning and development (L&D), on the other hand, is a workplace function responsible for empowering employee growth and development through continued opportunities for learning and furthering education.
The investment in L&D has clear benefits for employers and employees.
In providing opportunities for L&D, employers can:
- build commitment and engagement within the workforce
- develop skills to secure the business’ future growth
- provide employees with greater motivation to learn
- boost employees’ confidence in their roles
- help employees achieve their career goals
- boost employee retention
- discover hidden potential
- help attract new talent
The state of employee satisfaction in the UK
According to Standout CV, on average, Brits will hold nine jobs in their lifetime and work for six different employers over the span of a typical 50 year working life, while the average millennial will hold 15 jobs in the same period.
As previously mentioned, the pandemic saw a huge shift in employee behaviour, with around 11% of the UK workforce opting to make a job or career move since 2020.
While many employers are battling with an increasingly competitive jobs market and growing skills gap, employees are shedding light on the reasons for the so-called ‘Great Resignation’.
In 2021, employee experience platform Edenred conducted a study of 2000 workers to establish the reasons for so many opting to jump ship.
They found that the top five reasons cited were lack of motivation (15%), feeling overworked (14%), lack of focus on wellbeing from management (14%), poor atmosphere (14%, and feeling underpaid (13%).
Career development wasn’t far behind, though, with ‘no room to progress’ sitting in 7th place, and ‘not the career I wanted’ in 9th.
So how can employers better support employee career development?
Research published in 2023 by software company Lattice found that only 15% of employees are given the opportunity to regularly discuss career growth with management in work.
Incredibly, less than one in three reported having regular one-to-ones with their line manager, just 22% have clear performance expectations and metrics, and only 11% have a professional development budget.
With numbers like these, it’s hardly surprising that so many list career progression and development as key concerns.
Ultimately, in the current job climate, employers can no longer afford not to invest in their employees’ development, and a greater understanding of the benefits of L&D initiatives – both financial and practical – is required.
While many companies will be reluctant to put the initial time and effort into putting initiatives like these in place, the process doesn’t have to be complicated and can produce incredible results for employees at all levels.
Take a look below at our recommended first steps.
6 Steps to implementing a winning L&D initiative
Successful implementation of career development initiatives that enhance employee satisfaction and retention need a strategic approach.
Below, we have outlined six practical steps to help your business build a robust and effective L&D program tailored to your organisation’s needs.
Step 1: Assess specific needs
This first step is vital for developing a successful, air-tight L&D initiative, so it’s important time is taken to assess the needs of the organisation as a whole, department teams, and individual team members.
You need to understand what challenges are currently being faced at each level of the business and how the initiative can address them. For example:
- Are there any team members who are showing an interest in a new skill role that could help them develop and progress within their existing role?
- Do any department heads need additional skills or knowledge within their team that could be obtained through additional training?
- Could you reallocate funds for recruitment to upskilling existing team members to share the workload?
Step 2: Define objectives
Again, it’s important to look at the bigger picture here.
Not only do you need to understand the training and learning objectives for this initiative, but how they will tie into shorter and longer term business goals.
Work with department managers to establish individual learning goals for employees, and build up a picture of how these goals and their outcomes will directly impact business objectives.
Not only will this give you a better idea of how everything links together, but you’ll also be able to create development plans and KPIs for each team member based on their individual learning path, allowing you to effectively assess the success of the scheme.
Step 3: Establish ownership
It’s all well and good having a fantastic L&D strategy in place, but if you don’t have someone owning and monitoring the project, things will fall apart fairly quickly.
L&D initiatives are typically built with a specific structure, often owned by HR and supported by department heads.
Establish a structure that works for your business and employees and, most importantly, start small. It’s always best to use a trial and error approach on a smaller scale and build up the program once you’ve established what works and what doesn’t.
Step 4: Establish the most effective delivery methods
The good news is, there are dozens of delivery methods for L&D programs. The bad news is, there are dozens of delivery methods for L&D programs. See where we’re going with this?
With options from bringing in experts to deliver workshops, to sending employees on in-person courses, investing in eLearning portals and even hosting regular internal skill share sessions, deciding how to structure your L&D program can feel overwhelming.
Work closely with managers and employees to establish how people learn best, what delivery methods best suit the skills you’ve identified to invest in, and draw up an initial plan to trial.
Step 5: Create a flexible structure
This step is closely linked to step 4. Once you’ve established which delivery methods will be most efficient for your program objectives, you can begin to build a flexible program that will engage all employees and provide various methods of learning to accommodate individual needs.
But it’s important to remember that your employees are individuals and learn in different ways and there won’t be a one-size-fits-all approach.
Step 6: Implement, monitor and adjust
Once your L&D initiative is up and running, ensure you receive feedback from the people using it to establish what’s working and what needs improvement.
Things to consider are:
- Are there any gaps that still need addressing?
- Are the chosen delivery methods effective?
- Are employees being given enough time during work hours to dedicate to L&D?
It’s important at this stage to get feedback and input from people at all levels – employees, management, and HR.
But ensure you give the initiative enough time to bed in before making any major adjustments – we recommend at least 3 months before gathering the first round of feedback.
From there, monitor and adjust at a rate that works best for your business, whether that be quarterly, bi-annually or annually.
