Effective Employee Development: 3 Tips from the Best Leaders

When people have the opportunity to take deep dives into their individual gifts, talents, and strengths they become curious and excited to learn more. I believe most people strive to be the best version of themselves when given the opportunity to do so. In turn, when you gift your people these opportunities they become more curious about themselves and their colleagues, they are more engaged and feel more fulfilled.

This is part 3 of the 4-part series on Employee Development by Diana Gabriel, Certified Strengths Strategy Coach.

Development plans are most effective when they are highly individualized, focused, and worth striving for. Click To Tweet

Raising the level of an employee‘s value is not simply providing them more training; effective development touches every aspect of their experience, including self-awareness, technical, managerial and interactive skills.

I wrote about this in my last post, Successfully Developing Your People. Your staff who contribute the most to your organization are given the resources and space to be reflective, the ability to know what they’re doing, apply what they know, enjoy what they do and grow personally.

How do you Intentionally Develop Your People?
Career planning is often overlooked as a long-term process that identifies an employee’s ambitions, skills and opportunities to grow. As a leader you should always be mindful of how each individual on your team can maximize their potential and provide the most value while contributing to the greater good.

Development plans are most effective when they are highly individualized, focused on the aspirations of the individual, and you are in agreement that they are worth striving for. Developmental steps can be documented and tracked to make the process effective. You need to mentor, guide, encourage, and assist individuals along the way to make their experience fulfilling and provide the best outcomes.

Any worthwhile plan has a measurable means of tracking progress and accomplishment. Criteria for successful development are not difficult to create but are necessary to assess the status of the employee’s journey. A milestone, for example, may be that the employee completes a formal training series or finishes a project using newly attained or discovered skills.

Another process-related aspect of people development may actually be the minimization of some processes. In other words, reduce the red tape and technicalities people often face in the completion of assignments. A mindful leader will mend political fences or streamline an official approval procedure to help their people accomplish their work.

When this topic comes up with my coaching clients, we discuss the importance of identifying, reducing or redirecting mundane tasks or routine busywork whenever possible. Put as much authority into your employee’s hands as you can and their growth will accelerate. Be interested in deepening their self-awareness along with developing new skills and expertise, and give them the time to do that.

How do you mindfully create effective employee development? I’d love to hear from you. You can reach me here and on LinkedIn.