Managing internal careers? Myth or reality?
My first position in human resource management was concerned with managing careers internally. In this position, I remember developing job maps and skill profiles to help employees change positions more easily within the company according to their skills and key competences; a large scale project which took me over a year. Being the young human resources manager I was, I saw in the project a unique opportunity to position the company I was working for as one of the avant-garde employers, to reduce employee turnover that left due to lack of career perspectives, and to encourage the professional and personal development of employees.
That didn't include managers…
In fact, how many executives identified as having high potential, having benefited from coaching programs and having taken on a training and mentoring program really stay in the company long-term? The best often leave to achieve their goals elsewhere, regardless of the MBA financed for them which they should payback. Do you know why? Because they don’t have the sense (or the patience) to wait for a position to open. For an executive of 30 to 35 years old, 3 years is too long. On top of that what guarantee do they have of being offered the position?
Some companies have also got themselves burnt on this territory. Word of mouth in the company spreads quickly for this type of thing. “They promised me this position, I played their game and waited and someone else got it…” It is also true that it’s difficult to commit in the long-term, who knows if the horse you back will be the right one in 3 or 5 years?
Does that mean that I don’t believe in internal mobility? NO of course not! I only believe it if the company proves that it is a reality, that the employees follow a path leading them to take on higher or more specialized positions. Don’t forget that internal upward mobility is not compulsory but it can offer employees alternative paths. If you invite an internal employee to an interview, accept them with genuine intentions and give them a real chance. How many times have I heard, “we have an internal procedure just to go through the motions but we won’t actually take anyone.” It only results in wasted energy and frustration. Make your decisions and be frank and open with your employees! At the same time, how often have candidates said to me “my boss refuses to let me work in another internal group so he organized it so that I couldn’t have the job!”?
It is a shame that it easier to leave the company than to evolve within it. As long as managers don’t play the internal mobility card and keep their resources for themselves, there will be no true internal career management…Unless we give them ways of encouraging exchanges. If we get stuck in the concept of “I undress so and so to clothe someone else” a manager will see no benefit in letting one of his employees go to another department (I am putting myself in their place), but if you offer them an exchange solution then they will listen. Internal mobility therefore costs and requires a special budget, it is in no way a solution to lowering external recruitment costs, on the contrary, it is a long-term investment!
