5 ways to help employees around career roadblocks

The days of assessing an employee’s skills and goals in annual reviews may be over.

In the current talent war, if you want to keep your best employees from walking out the door, you need to work with them – now – to remove career roadblocks at your company and equip them to move ahead. And that effort should be an ongoing conversation, not a once-a-year event.

Though some economists debate whether the U.S. is in the throes of a Great Resignation or a Great Reshuffling, employers brace for a different downturn while still facing talent issues – record numbers of employees are wondering whether their current jobs should remain their future jobs.

The following are five steps to help you help employees grow skills, navigate around career roadblocks, and contribute to your company:

1. Acknowledge the current climate. A 2021 ICC Workforce Trends study reports that, heading into this year, talent retention remains one of business leaders’ biggest concerns. The pandemic didn’t cause, but did likely accelerate, this talent migration. Today’s generation of workers has already shown that they will go where the opportunities are.  So, employers can forget about holding onto workers unless they create opportunities.

Employers must acknowledge that they could do a better job of reducing the systemic career roadblocks that exist in most organizations. That may mean a willingness to change everything from how and when employee skills are evaluated to expanding learning opportunities beyond tuition reimbursement. It definitely means that upskilling and conversations about advancement can no longer be just the responsibility of human resources.

2. Communicate paths to advancement. At the end of the day, employees must own their own careers. But employers can and should play a role, by creating an environment where employees can grow their skills and openly share their career goals. That means creating pathways for advancement and communicating those pathways, so employees don’t have to sniff out a way forward through office networking, rumor, and overheard watercooler conversations. It also means actively outlining a way around roadblocks and through skill barriers. When you make an employee’s end goal part of the conversation, they can visualize that ultimate destination and how to get there.
3. Change the culture. Managers spend a lot of time telling employees how they could do better in their current role, but little or no time telling them how to advance. Often, that’s because managers are busy worrying about other departments poaching their prize employees. Fixing that requires a culture change in the organization, one that comes from the top and acknowledges that encouraging employees to move up or over is good for the company.
4. Create a map to the employee’s career destination. Don’t leave your employees to guess which skills you are going to need next year, in five years, or in 10 years. That’s the company’s job.

Once again, communication is key. Employers think they are providing everything employees need to gain relevant skills and employees are saying we don’t know what we’re supposed to do. A University of Phoenix/EdAssist survey bore that out, reporting a significant discrepancy between the credentials employees are pursuing and those that managers want them to have.

Before employees can head down that path to the future, they have to know where they stand in the present. Employers who hope to retain talent must provide the most objective methods possible to evaluate an employee’s existing skills – and identify where there are gaps in the skills they need to advance or just stay relevant.

5. Help them get there. Employees starting out on a journey to their dream job must be allowed to commit to a roadmap – without making it a covert operation. They need clearly communicated mile markers to let them know how they’re progressing. And, throughout, the employer must facilitate the journey by providing training options, tuition assistance, internal projects that provide opportunities to develop skills, as well as mentoring and coaching.

Don’t fall into the trap of convincing yourself that providing training and tuition assistance isn’t worth the expense. A study by LinkedIn Learning found that 98% of employees would stay at a company longer if it invested in their career development. More and more managers are getting the message and doing just that. You can’t afford not to be one of them.

Related: Leadership roles for women still an uphill battle

As every manager knows, it’s expensive to have employees leave and even more expensive to replace them. That’s why, more than ever, your best talent pool is your own workforce.

Given the current talent shortage and the potential economic benefits of building internal pathways for employees to advance, employers today can’t afford not to do it.

Leo Goncalves is vice president, Workforce Solutions Group, University of Phoenix.