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Monday, March 07, 2016

Development Plans

How to develop and implement an employee development plan that drives to career growth?

Introduction

Plans do not develop anyone—only development experiences develop people. 

We see examples where people put more effort and attention into the planning process than they do into the development process. Development plan that drives to career growth process has lots of to-do s, forms, charts, meetings, due dates and checklists. They sometimes create a false sense that the planning process is an end in itself rather than a precursor to real development. Many of us fall into the same trap regarding physical fitness. We have may have fantastic plans in place to lose weight. We may be very proud of our plans, which include detailed daily goals for diet, alcohol consumption, and exercise. And if our execution were half as impressive as our planning, we would be very slim & fit. Our focus should be on weight loss, not planning for weight loss.

Consider we’re highly trained and experienced at this phase of our professional careers as senior managers. Organizations require their employee career development as a part of their organizational vision in order to drive performance, retain people and breed satisfaction.

Career development requires a systems approach. In simple terms means 'Providing employees an opportunity to grow', especially to those employees who deliver performance in a systematic form. This is why capturing and storing essential data about each employee is critical. As a general rule of thumb, your development plan must impact on your: Training path, performance evaluation, awards & recognition, special skills & competencies, promotions, pay increments and many other fields which depict the capability profile of an individual. Below are some examples what growth may possibly mean to an employee:

  • Climbing up the ladder in the organizational hierarchy.
  • On-going increase in salary.
  • Acquiring higher level skills & competencies.
  • Occupying higher level Job positions/titles.
  • Having an opportunity to benefit from some exclusive benefits/privileges.

Why We Need to Create a Development Plan?

Development Plans help the organization…

1. Build a global, diverse talent pipeline for leaders and individual contributors for targeted talent – attracting, developing, and retaining the best and the brightest

2. Build required capabilities of our employees through development and learning

3. Keep strong performers within the organization by constantly challenging them either in their current role or desired future role

4. Address generation issue in a more straightforward way

Organization’s talent pool is the most important asset and in order to build on our skill sets and desires to be successful our company has to make sure that they are doing all they can as an organization and leadership team to build the bridge between where an employee is currently and where the business needs us to be…what are the business goals and how does current talent pool line up to the business and customer needs.

The Importance of Analysis while creating effective development plans

Career development is a composite organizational process which involves people, addresses their ambitions, assigns them roles and responsibilities aligned with their potential, evaluates their performance, and promotes referral based Job opportunities to accommodate growth ambitions of employees. Since there are a variety of types of development opportunities available for employees we have to figure how to determine what makes sense for our goals.

Employees decide what they want from their careers now and in the future.

  1. Examine individually, or along with their managers, their interests & ambitions.
  2. Create 'Development Plans' by obtaining inputs from the managers, observing market trends, aligning themselves with other peers to meet the requirements of the current Job and to cater for the long term perspectives.
  3. Work with the mentor, manager to identify on the job learning and training opportunities and other avenues for professional development.

While creating your development plan keep in mind that:

  1. You are helping your manager to identify the job-related knowledge, skills, competencies and experience needed for you to be effective in that position.
  2. You are endorsing pro-active planning to engage with future promotional opportunities.
  3. You are helping your juniors to define their short and long term development needs which support organizational objectives and employee's career goals.
  4. You are indicating specific steps that need to be initiated to accomplish your learning goals in a formal form.
  5. You are expressing yourself in communicating the type of tasks which will be best suited for your career growth.

How developing SMART targets helps us to identify capabilities 

To ensure quality in results, it is imperative that targets are formulated and set in a S.M.A.R.T. way!

Specific-concrete

  • Is the objective clear and precise?

Measurable

  • Do you know how to measure it?

Is it possible to see clearly whether the objective is achieved?

Action oriented

  • Do you really know what kind of an action is expected from you?

Realistic

  • Do you think that your target is challenging enough but also achievable?

Time bound

  • Have clear timeframes for the achievement of the target been set?

Which of these capabilities that you may like to advance?

1. Healthcare Operations or whichever industry you perform at

2. Industry Knowledge (Healthcare Regulations or any applicable industry norms)

3. Product Knowledge

4. Communication Skills

5. Project Management Skills

6. Facilitation Skills

7. Team Building Skills

8. Problem Solving Skills

9. Understanding Contracts (Internal and/or External)

10. Software Tools

11. Quality Process (Order Fulfillment, Project Management Methodology)

12. Product Functionality

13. Difficult Communications

While Building your development plan

"Do s"

* Stay realistic.

* Keep it simple.

* Measure outcomes, not process

"Don’t s"

* Fail to be flexible when flexibility makes better business sense.
* Try to do too much, too fast.
* Neglect your individual development plan; instead layer in emphasis on on-the-job developmental experiences, such as rotations and stretch assignments, as opposed to” off-the-job” formal training programs.

Where am I? - Make Accurate Analysis to Discover Yourself

SWOT analysis will help you organize the information gathered in this planning process. Many of you are familiar with SWOT for a business analysis. SWOT is a strategic planning method to evaluate 4 arenas Strength or S, Weakness or W, Opportunities or O, and Threats or T. Typically used in business modeling, let's look at how SWOT can help you with career development.

S or Strength refers to employee attributes that are helpful to achieving a career/professional development objective. This can include core competencies such as technical knowledge and skills a person especially if these skills are transferable or niche; should also include experience and education. This arena also includes personal attributes and characters that may give someone advantages, such as, ability to work under pressure, innovative, or creative. An additional component is networks - what are the connections the employee has to other - internal and/or external to our organization.

W or Weaknesses refer to attributes of the employee that can be viewed as harmful to their success - some of these may have been identified in the gap analysis you just performed. These may include lack of work experience or lack of knowledge - especially if it is a gap in key areas you've identified as critical; this arena may also include negative or weak personal characteristics; such as presence/image/attitude - characteristics and behaviors that may be seen as obstacles/challenges such as indecisiveness or someone who is destructively confrontational. Lastly consider geographic limits – do you feel like you are locked into a specific geographic location or situation that may be seen as less desirable? You may certainly have good reasons for the geographic limitation but the limitation may still be just that, a limitation.

T or Threats - these are conditions which can do damage or threaten one's career field - these may include impacts due to corporate structure or culture, your limitations - for example, perhaps your niche skills are a strength but the niche is becoming obsolete so the same skills can be part of a threat, consider the degree of competition for a career - do others tend to have new or superior skills. Additionally consider changes in the business or field that may negatively impact career options.

O or Opportunities - this refers to conditions that are helpful in your career field- these may include latest patterns or trends or innovation in the field/company/industry (in Healthcare one might consider the governments push for meaningful healthcare as creating opportunity for us, opportunities may include how needed and valuable our skill sets are - the more our organization needs our talents/the better the opportunity. One might also include opportunities for professional development in one's field. Also consider the potential support system or network - this can be quite an asset. Lastly, consider your option for relocation, transfer-ability and skills.

A couple more factors to consider by a Manager

Helping to build your employees capabilities is just as crucial as your employees meeting the objectives and targets that are set for them. Typically these capabilities are the soft skills and receiving feedback and/or development in these areas can assist an employee in meeting some of our customer, financial and process targets.

High performers like to be challenged. They often times have other goals such as education, certifications that they would like achieve outside their day-to-day responsibilities of their current role. They see what they do everyday for us as a career and not just a job. Having a development plan and having it be supported by you guarantees that you will get our return on our investment.

Closure

In helping prepare you to create a development plan, I have reviewed components from What, Why, Where, How, and When perspectives around Definitions, Evaluation, Assessments, and Analysis angle.

In each step/phase – I've given you tips tools and resources you and the manager can use to create an impact in development plan. Keep in mind that it will take some time to gather the information for the evaluation of making insightful assessments; plus at least couple of discussion sessions in a development dialogue with our manager. The goal is to drive our organization forward so if done well, it should reflect to be time well present.

As I've discovered, there are numerous resources in organizational development planning world –see below. That being said, sharing ideas with others may be helpful - don’t forget your colleagues are excellent resources too and of course don’t forget to touch base with your HR team for assistance.

Thank you again for taking time to review these notes and start making efforts to create/drive high performance culture.

Referenced Links:

  • Kramer, R. 2008. Learning How to Learn: Action Learning for Leadership Development. A chapter in Rick Morse (Ed.) Innovations in Public Leadership Development. Washington DC: M.E. Sharpe and National Academy of Public Administration, pp. 296–326.

  • Waddill, D. D. and M. Marquardt (2003). Adult learning orientations and action learning. Human Resource Development Review 2(4): pp. 406-429.

  • Career Development: A Policy Statement of the National Career Development Association Board of Directors (Adopted March 16, 1993; revised 2003)

  • Best Practices in Leadership Development and Organization Change, Best Practice Institute, by Louis L. Carter, Marshall Goldsmith, and David Ulrich by Jossey Utot The Leadership Development Guide Australian Leadership Development Centre

  • S. Cromwell & J. Kolb 2004, “An examination of work-environment support factors affecting transfer of supervisory skills training to the work place”, Human Resource Development Quarterly, Vol. 15 No. 4, pp. 449-71.

  • Herr, E.L., & Cramer, S. H. (1996). Career guidance and counseling through the lifespan: Systematic approaches. New York: HarperCollins) (Niles, S. G. & Harris-Bowlsbey, J (2002) Career Development Interventions in the 21st Century. Columbus, OH: Merrill Prentice Hall., pp.7

  • Baldwin, T. & Ford, K. (1988), "Transfer of Training: A Review and Directions for Future Research', Personnel Psychology, Spring, Vol. 41 Issue 1, pp. 63-105

  • Richard Arvid Johnson (1976). Management, systems, and society: an introduction. Pacific Palisades, Calif.: Goodyear Pub. Co. pp. 224–226. 

  • Newton Margulies (1972). Organizational Development: Values, Process, and Technology. New York, NY: McGraw-Hill Book Co. pp. 3.

  • Weisbord, Marvin. (1987). Productive Workplace: Organizing and managing for dignity, meaning and community. Jossey-Bass Publishers, San Francisco.

A Flowchart for Choosing Your Religion

A Flowchart for Choosing Your Religion

Looking for a JOB - How to Be the Next Hire

Making You the Most Viable Next Hire
Being flexible, creative and adaptable in today’s economy is the cornerstone to survival. The job search is no different and, with unemployment rising, requires just as much vigilance. One way you can keep your options open and make yourself even more marketable is by considering Consulting in addition to your quest for full-time employment. Often perceived as an “either-or” scenario, Consulting offers you just as many benefits as it does your “would be” employer:

Track record of Fixing Problems?
Career wise, people typically fall into one of two categories: those who thrive on problem solving and the prospect of a new challenge –or- someone who is exceptionally good at steering the ship once it is on course. If the thought of fixing something that is broken appeals to you (versus has you thinking about reaching for the Tylenol), then Consulting might be an avenue to explore.

A More Flexible Interview
Quite often, what a company needs is someone to tackle a specific problem, not a new full-time employee. Identifying this in the interview and being able to present yourself as the solution to their problem (at a lower cost), can ultimately create a job tailor made for you and your skill set. No one can compete against that.

Dating Before Marriage
A consulting engagement can give you the opportunity to see if this company is a nice place to visit or a great place to live. The only thing worse than a prolonged job search, is ending up in a position that results in you being unemployed again in 6-12 months. Consulting lets you do more due diligence than you could ever accomplish in an interview.

“Consulting” on Your Resume
To many recruiters, seeing “consulting” as your current role without any clients/engagements is just a way to dress up being out of work. But, with a list of key accomplishments at those engagements, you show that you are in demand, have more control over your search and are broadening your experience. The latter is extremely important if you are looking to transition industries.

Change Agent
For companies looking to make some sort of change internally (and you should like this if you have a track record of fixing problems), consulting is a more preferred approach versus hiring a permanent employee. It is much easier to come in as a consultant, effect the course correction and then hand it off to the internal leadership.

Money
Besides the obvious benefit of having income during your search, it also gives you breathing room to be more objective in selecting your next job.

It’s Easier to Find a Job When You Already Have One
So much of what makes this true is that fact that when you are employed, you tend to be a bit more objective because you have a “bird in hand.” Consulting (in addition to easing that financial strain, which helps here) can provide the self-assurance that comes along with being employed, which can get whittled away while unemployed.

Presenting yourself as a viable consultant or full time employee isn’t mutually exclusive. Rather, they are simply two sides to the same coin. For the companies where you interview, this will only make you more viable and versatile in your eyes. For you, there is nothing to lose. The worst thing that happens here is you generate some income to inevitable financial strain of your job search. On the other hand, you might just find through this process that you discover your next career move.

Bağdat Caddesi

Gel de parmaklara hakim ol, yapma bir Caddebostan, Bağdat Caddesi nostaljisi şimdi!...diğer bir deyişle 'Karşı taraf' . Cok uzun seneler yazları gittiğim, son yıllarda ise her Türkiye'ye gittiğimde kaldığım Istanbul'un bir başka eşşiz köşesi.
1960'lı 70'li yıllarda köşkleriyle, bahçelerinden salkım salkım sarkan ortancalarıyla, billur gibi denizliyle, 'sayfiye' yeri olmasıyla meşhur Erenköy, Suadiye, Caddebostan.

Dükkanların az, ağaçların çok olduğu, bunca yıl geçmesine rağmen hala güzelliğini koruyan Bağdat Caddesi. On, onbir yaşımdan itibaren yazlarım geçti oralarda. Sokaklarda oynanırdı o zamanlar, öyle pek araba filan geçmezdi. Doyasıya bisiklete binilir, el birakarak gitmek büyük marifet sayılır Erenköy, Saskınbakkal, Göztepe bisikletle rahat rahat gidilir dönülürdü. Deniz için bazı sokakların denize vardıkları noktalarda bulunan kayıkhanelerden saatlik ücretle kayık kiralanır, kadın erkek kürek çekmeyi bilir, kayıktan denize girilirdi. Bazı gençler dalıp iskele ayaklarından midye toplar bazıları ise sığ kumda zıpkınla vatos avlarlardı. Sokaklardan dondurmacılar geçerdi o zamanlar. Simdiki gibi binbir çeşit ne gezer 'Dondurma, Kaymaaak' diye bağıran dondurmacının küçücük arabasında sadece kaymaklı ve limonlu dondurma olur, bazen ise çeşit olsun diye vişneli bulunurdu.

Caddebostan Plajı'nın yanı sıra bir de üyelikle girilebilen klüpler vardı. Marmara Yelken Klubü başta olmak üzere, Balıkadamlar, Caddebostan Yat Klübü ve İstanbul Yelken. Eğer bunlardan birine üyeyseniz veya üye bir arkadaşınız varsa bazı sporları yapma veya izleme olanağınız olur, voleybol, ping pong oynar, kıyıdan yelkenlilerin yarışlarını izlerdiniz. Denizin ortasında ise köfteciler vardı. Bunlardan aklımda kalanı ise mayomuzun kenarına sıkıştırdığımız parayla yüzdüğümüz, veya kayıkla yanaştığımız 'Fıştak'tı. Dönerken yüzülüyorsa demirlemiş kayıklara tutuna tutuna, dinlene dinlene yüzülürdü.

Akşamüstüne doğru herkesi bir 'piyasa' heyecanı alırdı. Saçlar yıkanır, bildiğımız ütüyle ütülenerek düzeltilir, ve (Bağdat) Cadde'ye binbir tur atmaya çıkılırdı. Bir aşağı, bir yukarı. Parkur ise genellikle Santral Durağı'ndan Saşkınbakkala kadardı. O zaman 'cafe' adeti bir elin parmaklarını geçmez, 'Borsa'da yer bulabilmek için hızlı davranmak gerekir, 'Divan' ise gençlere çok pahalı geldiğinden ancak hafif 'yaşı geçmiş'lerin duraklama mekanı olurdu. Hali varaba sahiakti oldukça yerinde olan birkaç genç ise bir aşağı bir yukarı arabayla giderek Mustang veya Corvette'leriyle gelene geçene hava atarlardı.

Geceleri ise açık hava sinemalarının keyfine doyulmazdı. Caddebostan'daki Ozan Sineması'nda genellikle Türk filmleri oynar, çıkınca biraz aşağıda, Caddebostan Maksim Gazino'sunun (MIGROS)yakınındaki büfe'de 'zümküfül' yenirdi (Bir çeşit sosisli sandoviç ) Yabancı filmlerin mekanı ise Budak Sineması'ydı (Şimdiki CKM). Yastıgını kapıp tahta iskemlelere yerleştirdikten sonra, çekirdeğini çıtlatarak izlenirdi filmler. Bazen bu sinemalarda Cem Karaca gibi o zamanın ünlü sesleri konserler verir, bazıları ağaç tepelerinden konser izlerdi.

Sonra sonra o köşkler birer birer yıkılmaya, yerlerin uzun uzun binalar dikilmeye, Cadde'deki evlerin yerlerini dükkanlar almaya, arabalar çoğalmaya, faytonlar yok olmaya, tekerlekli dondurmacıların yerini Algida'cılar almaya başladı. Ama ne mutlu ki tüm büyümeler, kalabalıklaşmalar rağmen 'Cadde'yi bozmayı başaramadı! O hala 'Cadde', İstanbul'un ,Türkiye'nin en güzide caddesi hala boydan boya yürümekten zevk aldığım, bir yerde oturup geleni geçeni izlemenin keyfini her yıl bir iki hafta yaşayabildiğim bir yer.

Galata' ya dogru...

Galata' ya dogru...

The best way to improve health care requires physicians and other stakeholders

My honest approach for how to improve the care is to support a methodology such as being self-serving. I would like to start a program to introduce a software-based point-of-care tool for obtaining patient feedback. This real time information can be used with clients to positively impact the patient experience, nurse engagement, physician (soft skills) competence and overall quality. In my perspective the criteria for fulfilling the demand for finding the best way to improve healthcare is that it need be simple to implement, impactful and cost effective. The most impact to healthcare improvement will come from process improvement and healthcare provider recruitment AND retention. The by-products will be reduced cost of care and improved patient satisfaction. This applies to hospitals and private practices. Based on current studies and the economy, supplying adequate healthcare to the community is already tough and is going to get more challenging. Recruiting sufficient healthcare coverage will boost revenue and provide some improvement to patient satisfaction (wait time and access). However, failure to retain the medical staff will significantly hurt the outcome. With high demand and low supply, it will be well worth the time and money to present "we have the greenest pastures here". The method mentioned above may be called such as point-of-care through successful implementations that may turn in to popular key parts of process improvement. You need to have some feedback from the patients and the physicians in order to measure the processes that should be or are currently being improved. In order to achieve this you have to create the acronym HOSPITAL to help those in Healthcare recall the numbers of different types of inefficiencies in any medical facility. Those who have been exposed to Six Sigma and Lean have an appreciation for improvement opportunities and generally view things through differently trained eyes that can see within all those facilities. Publishing the results of the similar programs online may offer a transparent access to the consumers to monitor these inefficiencies. Welcoming any feedback relative to this and encourage your staff to consider this method or similar training methods for their teams will be highly critical for the outcome. We have to understand that it is impossible to solve a problem that we are unaware of. By providing even the most basic tools at the lowest level possible, these problems have a way of surfacing. While everyone recognizes that healthcare systems and organizations need to improve, I think not enough time is spent on firstly identifying the key stakeholders, and secondly properly ENGAGING them. I strongly believe that not enough time is spent trying to engage physicians in this process. In my experience too many of these "improvement strategies" are top-down decisions by non-clinical managers who failed to conduct any research into what physicians might want or what stumbling blocks there are/were to get them to adopt the new technologies. EMR/EHR/CPOE are prime examples - all of these require a breakdown in the normal activity flow of providers, as it requires them to either find and log on to a terminal or carry a bulky instrument. Almost all clients and colleagues I have worked with resent and resist those methods. And look how few MDs are part of Healthcare consulting firm teams. IMHO, I believe more energy should be spent engaging rather than alienating MDs as a first step, then doing the same for patients in order to get buy in from the two key stakeholders as I see it. I've always found that engaging these stakeholders on projects from the beginning results in more buy-in and most importantly, better recommendations/outcomes (a better product).

ULTIMATE RESULTS

ULTIMATE RESULTS

Ilhan Arsel

Ilhan Arsel

BJK FOREVER

BJK FOREVER
Karga kartalların sırtına oturur ve boynunu ısırır. Kartal cevap vermez, kargayla savaşmaz; kargaya zaman veya enerji harcamaz, bunun yerine sadece kanatlarını açar ve göklerde yükselmeye başlar. Uçuş ne kadar yüksek olursa, karganın nefes alması o kadar zor olur ve sonunda karga oksijen eksikliği nedeniyle düşer. Kartaldan öğrenin ve kargalarla savaşmayın, sadece yükselmeye devam edin. Yolculuk için gelebilirler ama yakında düşecekler. Dikkat dağıtıcı şeylere yenik düşmenize izin vermeyin....yukarıdaki şeylere odaklanmaya devam edin ve yükselmeye devam edin!! Kartal ve Karga dersi