Career Paths: Charting Courses to Success for Organizations and Their Employees

Preface xiii

Chapter 1 Introduction 1

What are Career Paths? 2

The Goal of This Book 19

Overview 21

Chapter 2 A Conceptual Toolkit for Constructing Career Paths 23

Career Path Attributes 26

Career Path Patterns 27

Outcomes 29

The Bottom Line 31

Chapter 3 A Practical Toolkit for Constructing Career Paths 33

Sources and Methods 34

Past 34

Present 37

Future 37

A Note about the Special Role of Interviews and Focus Groups 38

How to Construct Career Paths 39

Initial Steps 39

Sequential List of Positions or Roles 47

Qualifi cations 53

Critical Developmental Experiences 54

Competencies that are Accrued, Strengthened, or Required 56

Career Success Factors 60

Other Information 63

Explicit Focus on Movement 64

Promoting Alignment 64

Assessment of Personal Attributes and Career Paths 64

Implementation Tips 65

The Bottom Line 67

Chapter 4 Integrating Career Paths into Talent Management Systems I: Recruitment, Hiring, Retention, Promotion, and Employee Development 69

Connecting the Employee to the Organization 69

Engaging the New Workforce 72

Recruitment and Hiring 73

Retention 80

Promotion 81

Development Planning and Execution 83

The Bottom Line 89

Chapter 5 Integrating Career Paths into Talent Management Systems II: Strategic Workforce Planning, the Early Identifi cation and Development of Executive Talent, and Succession Management 91

Keeping an Eye on the Big Picture 91

Strategic Workforce Planning 92

Identifying and Developing Early-Career, High-Potential Leadership Talent 95

Who Are Our High Potentials? 95

How Can We Develop (and Promote) Them Faster? 97

Managing Communications Regarding High Potentials 98

Succession Management 99

Evaluating Readiness for Promotion in the Context of Succession Management 101

Methods for Evaluating Readiness 102

Keeping Those "Not Yet Ready" on the Path(s) to Get There 102

The Bottom Line 105

Chapter 6 Expanding Success Beyond the Individual Organization – Industry and Economic Development Perspectives 107

Career Paths and the Industry Perspective 109

Examples 110

Differences between Industry Career Paths and Organizational Career Paths 116

Career Paths and the Economic Development Perspective 118

Examples 120

Differences between Career Paths Designed for Economic Development Purposes and Organizational Career Paths 124

Labor Market Analyses and Analyses of Cross-Occupation Requirements 125

Labor Market Analyses 125

Analyses of Requirements across Occupations 126

The Bottom Line 127

Chapter 7 Looking to the Future 129

Trend One – Demographic Trends 130

Implications for Organizations 131

Trend Two – Technology 132

Implications for Organizations 134

Trend Three – Globalization and Changing Organizational Structures 134

Implications for Organizations 135

Trend Four – Defi ning Career Success 136

Implications for Organizations 136

The Bottom Line 137

Career Path Resource List 139

Notes 143

References 147

Name Index 151

Subject Index 153