Many leading enterprises in Singapore recognise that their employees are one of their most valuable resources.
Every employee’s skill, talent, and knowledge contribute to the overall growth and success of an organisation. As such, a lot of employers are willing to invest in their employees’ professional development, and it’s not just to help with their people’s growth but also to improve their business.
If you’re a good employer, you’ll know that supporting your employees’ career advancement enhances their trust in you and the company. When you’re involved with your employees’ professional lives, they’ll realise that you’re invested in their futures – beyond what they can give you while employed. This helps keep top employees satisfied and committed to their roles.
Given the many benefits of assisting your employees’ career development, it’s important to actively promote it. If you want to find out how you can support your employees in order for them to grow professionally and advance in their careers, you’ve come to the right place. Here are several ways to do this effectively..
Promote Further Training and Learning
One way to successfully support your employees’ career goals is to encourage them to pursue further training and education. Apart from programmes related to their current roles in the company, your employees may want to consider enrolling in any SkillsFuture credit courses so they can upskill for a promotion they’ve always wanted or build knowledge in any one of Singapore’s emerging industries. It will help prepare them for the future, aside from being able to apply what they have learned to become more efficient in their current roles.
Alternatively, you can host learning sessions in your workplace and invite external or internal guest speakers. This can help spark the interest of employees who have yet to make definite career goals.
Understand Your Employees’ Professional Goals
Whether your employees are working remotely or on-site, communicate with them regularly to foster healthy professional relationships. When you interact with them, be sure to discuss your employees’ career objectives and find out how you can support them. To start, help your employees outline a potential career path within the company so they can better visualise their future with the organisation. Also, help identify specific milestones your employees can achieve to bring them closer to their goals.
As an employer, you also benefit from understanding and supporting your employees’ professional aspirations. Letting them work on their career objectives allows them to contribute more to the organisation. It also keeps them motivated and engaged with your enterprise’s mission and vision.
Mentor and Coach Employees
Mentoring and coaching are effective ways to use internal resources when supporting employees’ career advancement. By mentoring, managers and experienced employees can transfer knowledge and skills to newer members of the team. It also helps create a healthy company culture where communication between management and team members is encouraged.
Additionally, fostering a coaching and mentoring atmosphere in the workplace can benefit seasoned managers. As they work in tandem with newer members of the company, managers get a fresh perspective of their industry and their responsibilities.
Initiate Cross-Departmental Training
Another way to help your employees advance in their careers is by encouraging them to collaborate and train with other departments. It provides employees the opportunity to gain new skills and knowledge from other people within the organisation. This practice allows them to better understand the tasks, responsibilities, and working methods of other teams. It can also help employees deepen their understanding of your organisation’s business.
Once employees become knowledgeable of other departments’ duties, it will be possible for them to do a host of other things, from covering for one another’s responsibilities should the need arise to transitioning to new roles that may be their true calling. Employees also become more confident to help their colleagues in case the other workers need support in terms of overcoming professional challenges.
Arrange Regular Feedback Sessions
The best way to support your employees to become better professionally is to give them both positive and helpful feedback. The positive comments can motivate them to continue working hard, while learning about their shortcomings is also essential for their career growth. Without feedback, people won’t be aware of what aspects of their work they need to improve on.
If you want to help your employees grow, you need to organise a system that will allow you to objectively assess their performance. This way, you can pinpoint their strengths and identify which areas of their responsibilities they struggle with. While holding annual reviews is good practice, you can help improve employee development by doing the assessments and feedback sessions more regularly – for instance, by scheduling them monthly or quarterly.
With ongoing evaluation, employees can better understand which areas they will need training in as well as the kind of support they may need. As an employer or manager, make sure to come prepared for these feedback sessions. Propose opportunities for how your employees can enhance their skills and knowledge.
Supporting the professional development of your employees allows you to retain the best talent in your company. As important assets, employees will feel more valued when you show interest in their future. More importantly, employees get to learn new skills and knowledge that they can use to be more efficient at work, which can lead to further success for your organisation. If you’re wanting to truly help your people aside from growing your business, take the recommendations above into consideration.