As organisations navigate an ever-changing workforce landscape, balancing employee aspirations with organisational needs is key to driving success.
While businesses clearly recognise retention as a key goal, they often overlook employees' desire for personal growth and skill development. As a result, effective career interventions that support individual and career growth, such as tailored learning programmes and coaching, remain underutilised – leaving many employees and organisations at risk of stagnation.
So what’s holding everyone back?
Employees are simply happy where they are – Our latest research found that while 77% of employees plan to stay with their current employer, just 18% are considering an internal role move in the next 2 years. While a desire to avoid burnout and maintain a healthy work-life balance are undoubtedly contributing to this trend, this statistic also suggests that a lack of career support has left many individuals unaware of the transferability of their skills. They cannot see how or where they could potentially move internally, and so are opting to stick rather than twist – playing it safe in an unpredictable world.
Shirked responsibility for career progression – Employees believe employers are responsible for their future career path – a problematic sentiment in itself; but perhaps even more worrying is the fact that 66% of business leaders agree, and yet our research found that half of leaders say they aren’t planning to make significant investment in career interventions for their people in the next 5 years. Following the UK’s 2024 budget, businesses are understandably tentative – concerned with how increased operational costs will affect their bottom line – but this cannot excuse a lack of sufficient investment in their people. For an organisation to thrive, it needs its people to be mobilised and working at their full potential, and so surely the least employers could do is hold the door open for those looking to move forward.
Leaders’ shortsightedness is blocking development – When asked what their desired outcome for talent interventions is, 32% of leaders said employee retention – compared to just 19% of respondents who said “to encourage internal mobility”. Organisations appear to be prioritising the short-term need of having employees maintain productivity in their roles right now, instead of looking to futureproof their workforce and enable ongoing development. If employees are receiving zero encouragement from their leaders to pursue learning and growth opportunities, it’s no surprise less than 1 in 5 are looking to challenge the status quo and explore internal mobility.
A lack of communication when implementing support – While talent interventions such as coaching have long been proven to have significant benefits for employees, our latest research discovered that 1 in 3 employees said their career support actually had a negative impact on their careers. When implementing career interventions, its integral that business leaders provide context and clear communication as to why. If an employee is told to engage with a development initiative without any explanation, they may perceive this as a signal that they’re viewed as an underperformer and under scrutiny from the leadership team. Fearing they’re soon to be forced out of the organisation, many may choose to get ahead of the game and leave; meaning an individual loses trust in career support, while their employer loses a talented individual, and all over a lack of communication.
How coaching enables people and businesses to move forward with purpose
Despite coaching being a key driver of employees’ appetite for growth, with 44% of coached individuals expressing interest in further training and development initiatives, vs. 30% of those who haven’t been coached, just 20% of respondents say their employer has provided coaching support to help them in their career.
Whether it’s targeted 1:1 development coaching, team sessions, or on a peer-to-peer basis, coaching can empower individuals and teams to push the boundaries and achieve their true potential. A coach could help an employee identify and understand the transferability of their skills and pursue internal mobility opportunities; or encourage greater career ownership by helping people create targeted action plans that are aligned to their career aspirations. Insights generated from these sessions also empower employees to speak with their managers and leaders about their career– helping leaders better understand the aspirations of their people and generate improved ROI for the support they’re providing.
When talent interventions such as coaching are implemented with clear communication – immediately dispelling any potential misunderstandings of hidden agendas – people and organisations thrive. Our new research found that 22% of employees said more human interventions such as coaching would make the career support available to them more impactful. And with digital coaching platforms making the support more accessible than ever, there’s really no good reason for businesses not to invest in support for their people.
To find out more about how career interventions such as assessment and coaching can enable workforce agility, read our latest report – From Stagnation to Agility.
