When I wrote "The Seven C's of Employee Engagement," I included Career among the "C's". Here's the reference:
Career is so important to engagement and, in my experience, the number one reason why employees are not engaged. If employees are to sustain their engagement, they must be working in service of something bigger and more meaningful than the next merit increase or promotion. They must have a career goal in mind, and they must context their accomplishment and professional development against that goal. When this exists, so does discretionary effort. When it doesn't, my experience teaches that "above and beyond" effort is not sustained.
I promised to write more about this later. So, here it is. Let me share a personal story. I launched into my first job with IBM with a strong foundation: MBA Human Resources; meaningful professional experience with State University of New York, Computer Sciences Corporation, Intel and Lockheed Martin (first tour with them); and an orientation toward work that had me believing that I was made for HR. About 12 months into my time with IBM I was asked to consider a role in Compensation with ESPN in Bristol, Connecticut. I sat with my IBM mentor and shared that I was thinking about leaving. She asked a question that completely changed my orientation. She asked, "when are you going to stay with a company long enough to get to the 2nd job?"
This may not sound like such a profound question, but for me it was career changing. You see, at that time in my career, I had a wife and three sons and remembered just a few years prior supporting all of us on $25,000 per year. I recalled coming home one day and finding my wife crying because our adjustable rate mortgage "adjusted" and we'd need to pay $100 more per month. She asked "where will we find this money in a budget that each month lands at $0". Living check to check meant that I was always chasing the job that would pay a little more. It also meant that if I stayed with a company long enough to get to the first pay raise conversation, I knew that my prior year's performance better warrant a raise. My career horizon was exactly one year out.
Stay with a company long enough to get to the 2nd job? For me, this was an invitation to look beyond one year and envision the possible. While painful in the immediate term, I knew that if I could reset my time horizon to something longer term I could work in service of something bigger than the incremental dollars that would come with the next raise or new company. But for what would I work in service of attaining? With my mentor's help, I set for the first time in my life a career goal. It was not an easy thing to do and I knew that it might someday change. But, with her help, I grounded my goal in the answer to one, three part question:
What job sits out there that meets three tests - tests that emanate from classic motivation theory -
- I would VALUE the job. When I wake up in the morning and envision going to this job, I feel a rush of excitement. I want to do this job badly enough to actually work on my professional development plan to ready myself for it. I am willing to tell my family that this is the job "I must someday have." Example: I have always thought I would like to be an Attorney. What has stopped me? If I were to be honest with myself, I have not valued this occupation enough to actually work on my professional development plan to ready myself for it (I.e., sit for LSAT, prepare for bar exam, go to Law school). Fact: If one doesn't value a job enough to work to get it, then that job can't be one's career goal.
- I believe the job is ATTAINABLE. When I consider my God-given talents, academic preparation and work experience, I think there is a reasonable enough chance of attainment that I'm willing to construct a plan to get there. Attainability is tough in that I don't want to hear that I can't do something and, as an HR practitioner, I certainly don't want to be known as the "HR moron" who told Bill Gates that he's a nerd who will never be a CEO. The real test of attainability lies in "manufacturability." If I say that my career goal is CEO, is there a rational professional development plan I can construct that will start me down that path? Example: I would love to be the Prime Minister of France. How on earth would a person like me even start to manufacture a plan to attain this goal? Fact: If one can't construct a plan to get there, then that job can't be one's career goal.
- I believe that attainment is dependent on my PERFORMANCE and contributions to the business. If I'm in a family run business and I'm not a member of the family, even though I might value running the business and believe that the combination of my education and experience would make the job attainable, I realize that selection of the next person to run the business will have more to do with genealogy than with performance. Unless I can change families, running this business probably can't be my career goal. The more common reality underlying this test lies in "bridges burned." Perhaps over time and through the course of year to year business battles, I've disenfranchised people that are important to progression against my professional development plan. I might be at a point where, regardless of my performance and contributions to this business, I'm not going to earn sponsorship of the next step of my plan. Fact: If one can't get there on the basis of performance and contributions to the business, than that job can't be one's career goal.
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Let's circle back to the relevance of this to employee engagement. My experience teaches that genuine employee engagement is dependent, among other things, upon the belief of employees that a career is possible. If people are working solely in service of the next promotion or raise in pay, genuine engagement can't be sustained. Sooner or later you will disappoint them with the lack of promotion or size of the raise and, when you do, you will find their willingness to offer discretionary effort to wane. If, however, they are working in service of something bigger, a destination or goal that they value, believe to be attainable and believe is tied to performance, then the importance of today's raise or promotion decision is contexted against the bigger picture and, perhaps, engagement is sustained.
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The Learning
Genuine employee engagement requires that employees have a career goal; a destination. Remember Alice in Wonderland:
- "Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?"
- "That depends a good deal on where you want to get to," said the Cat.
- "I don’t much care where--" said Alice.
- "Then it doesn’t matter which way you go," said the Cat.
- "So long as I get SOMEWHERE," Alice added as an explanation.
- "Oh, you’re sure to do that," said the Cat, "if you only walk long enough."
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In my experience, too many companies tell their employees that they "own their own career" and, as such, they don't work with them to define their career goal. Meaning, employees "walk long enough" with no idea of "on where you want to get." Over time, they grow tired and frustrated. Having nothing with which to mark career progress, they over emphasize the importance of a raise in pay or promotion decision or treat overtures from competitors as a positive sign of their career progress. We owe it to ourselves as leaders to get maximum commitment from our employees and we owe it to our employees to help them derive a sense of destination and purpose.
Sit with them and ask them about their career goals. Test for value, attainability and viability. With a career destination in mind, all that is needed now is a plan to get there.
More on career planning in my next blog post.
Paul E. DuCharme. January 2013
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