CAREER MANAGEMENT

UNIT II

DEFINITION

Career management as a” process for enabling employees to better understand and develop their career skills and interests, and to use these skills and interests most effectively both within the company and after they leave the firm”. 

According to Arnold “Career Management is an attempt made to influence the career development of one of more people”

According to Greenhaus, “Career Management has been defined as the process by which individuals develop, implement and monitor career goals and strategies”

NEED FOR CAREER MANAGEMENT

1) Individual Perspective: From an individual point of view effective career

management is particularly important in light of the turbulent economic, technological and cultural environments. In rapidly changing and uncertain times, career success and satisfaction will most likely to be achieved by individuals who understand themselves, know how to detect changes in the environment, create opportunities for themselves and learn from their mistakes – all elements of effective career management.

Moreover, careers have become less structured, less automatic and more unpredictable. Established career paths are being replaced by more innovative and distinctive routes to success. As organization become more responsive to rapidly changing business priorities, greater flexibility will be required on the part of the employee. Flexibility and adaptability are hallmarks of effective career management.

Another pressure for effective management is the very nature of contemporary employees – active and assertive – who demand a high degree of control over their career and their lives.

NEED FOR CAREER MANAGEMENT

2) Organizational Perspective: Individuals who define career success in broad

terms and who feel the need it combine different parts of their lives in to a satisfying lifestyle have a real need to understand the nature of careers and to manage their careers actively. Organizations also have incentives for understanding careers. In fact, an organization’s ability to manage its human resources effectively depends on how well it understands its employees career needs and helps them to engage in effective career management.

PRINCIPLES OF EFFECTIVE CAREER MANAGEMENT 1)Consistency:

It should present consistent picture of the organization’s strategy

2) Pro Activity: It should be concerned with maintaining current

capabilities and ensuring future flexibility by anticipating the future direction of the organization.

3) Collaboration: It is based on the partnership between the employer

and the employee

4) Dynamism: It should be flexible enough to respond to changing

organizational and individual circumstances and needs.

IMPORTANCE OF CAREER MANAGEMENT

1)Helps in Developing Good Management and Leadership Skills:

It increases a chances of success as it teaches us a lot about where you are headed, what you need to do, and what needs to be done to help others to understand point in an organization.

2) It helps to Gain Confidence: It helps in knowing where we are headed and what our

next step is going to be are less likely to hesitate at any point in life

3) Opens Doors of Opportunity: It provides new thoughts and ideas, which open more

doors of opportunity because of career will stand out from the crowd, in addition if it offer services and ideas and your ideas change lives, will have a high chance of reaching out to people and meeting their needs

4)It Gives Chance to Show Capability: It provides a chance to the individual to show his

capability to complete tasks and have everything done before the stated down time.

CURRENT PRACTICES OF CAREER MANAGEMENT

1)Career Audits: It is a process that encourages a complete and thorough

analysis of skills,interests,goals and motivations. The purpose of career audit is to carefully review where the person is today and where he would like to be in the future. An honest career audit can reveal patterns and trends that can easily escape notice if they are not subjected to the same scrutiny that is applied to other professional activities. It also helps to find out the most relevant skills and experience that one can highlight during his job search in anew industry. Career audits should be undertaken with regularity. Waiting until a crisis arises before performing an audit reduces the effectiveness of the process and increase the likelihood that decisions will be based on the emotions of the moment.

2) Career Counselling and Interviews: Career counselling takes care of various aspects like

personal insight,support and even a better understanding .

CURRENT PRACTICES OF CAREER MANAGEMENT

It helps to set up some goals of consequence and give his best in achieving them.

It inspires every individual to make a career for themselves in field which their interest and passion lies. By doing so, it aids every individual to know his own powers and the success that nowhere else but inside him only.

3) Job Shadowing and Mentoring: Job shadowing involves the learners spending time observing

someone else who is carrying out a job. They spend time watching, listening and learning what the job is about and what is involved in a typical day’s work, without actually carrying out the job itself.

Mentoring can take the traditional form of an ongoing relationship in which a mentor and a mentee meet on a regular basis to help the mentee develop her/his career, or it can be a shorter-term process of helping to nurture a mentee's growth during one or a f opics discussed with mentors can include career advice, moving around and up in the organization, feedback on skills/knowledge, gaining perspective on the organization, and many other topicsew teachable moment(s).

CURRENT PRACTICES OF CAREER MANAGEMENT

4) Executive Coaching: It is one to one training and collaborative relationship

between a certified or self proclaimed coach and an executive interested in improving himself or herself primarily in career or business related skills. It is chosen to develop executive level skills, developmental and growth needs which impact the entire action, performance improvement, personal growth and better business results for the organization's such it involves understanding and leveraging on an individual’s strength, as well as recognizing and overcoming his or her weakness.

5) Job Rotation: It is about settling employees at the right place where they

can deliver the maximum results. Job rotation helps HR managers determine who can be replaced by whom and create a suitable and beneficial fit. Whether an employee wants to be promoted or not, job rotation improves their skills and gives them a broader understanding of the inner workings of a company.  

CURRENT PRACTICES OF CAREER MANAGEMENT

6) Cross Training: It refers capability of the employees to do multiple tasks, especially

on short notice if certain staff members are not available. It involves training the staff members in areas that are not their usual responsibility. It is a strategy for enhancing knowledge of the interpersonal activities of other team members involving in the purest form, temporarily taking the role of others.

It is training that places the trainee in the job situation of another worker, usually in a different but related job. Good cross training has objectives for the learner, a plan for instruction, an evaluation and feedback process, and someone in charge of the learning .

7) Systemic Management of Relocation/Job Transition:

It is a change in work roles or responsibilities such as a change in job content, status or location. Transition often occur when moving from one functional areas to another such as from marketing to human resources, when moving up in the organization or when moving to ajob in another organization.

Transition is challenging b’cos managers who move to different jobs are often closely watched and must prove themselves all over again

CURRENT PRACTICES OF CAREER MANAGEMENT

They take managers out of familiar situations in which they have set routine behaviors and place them in situation in which they must develop new ones..

8) Provision of a Variety of Contracts and Systems:

Various provisions should be provided to employee to meet their individual needs like part time, job-share, career breaks, flexitime,cafeteria benefits, paternity leave, crèche facilities.

9)Computer Aided Career Management Information System:

It comprises of occupational information(Eg: job, positions available) and career development information(i.e., for purpose of interpretation of needs, interests, attitudes and aspirations). This programmes fulfill a number of career management needs, including information on various career topics, personality and skills assessment, listings of job vacancies and career decision making support.