Career conversations are a great opportunity to support the development of your team, engage them and motivate them to perform too.
This career conversations guide provides everything that you need to have effective career conversations with your team: it takes you step-by-step through how to prepare, have the conversation and follow up with the necessary actions.
The impact of career conversations
When you have effective and regular career conversations with your team they’re more likely to be satisfied with their work and motivated to perform.
In a recent Right Management survey, 82% of respondents said they would be more engaged in their work if their managers have regular Career Conversations with them.
And in this GP Strategies research report, 83% of respondents said career support has an impact on their level of engagement.
Employees want greater frequency and less formality in their career conversations.
The benefits to you and your team of regular career conversations are substantial! Engagement, retention, motivation: they’re all positively impacted by career conversations.
It may see daunting if you’ve never tried to have these conversations before, but it’s worthwhile to get into a regular rhythm of career conversations.
It’s important to note: career conversations are NOT the same as development conversations. Career conversations take place less frequently and are focused on helping your team member to plan their career.
Think of it this way: career conversations are about “where do you want to get to?”, development conversations are more about “what skills do you need to help you on the journey?”.
They’re connected topics, but you’ll have better conversations with your team if you focus on one at a time.
Development conversations and career conversations are an opportunity to show your team member that you care about them, and their future.
Career Conversations Guide: Introduction
This career conversations guide includes:
- Before the meeting: the questions you should ask your direct report to consider, as well as how you should prepare yourself.
- During the meeting: how to structure the conversation, the approach you should take, and the outcomes that you can expect from the meeting.
- After the meeting: the actions that you should expect from your direct report, and the actions you should take yourself.
It will also help you to explore the career conversation examples that you might face, and how to handle them.
Before the career conversation meeting
This should not be an ‘add on’ to a regular meeting. To make the right impact, take the time to schedule a separate meeting. Make it clear that this is a career conversation, the focus is on understanding your team member’s career aspirations and how you can support them.
Remember, your team member is responsible for their own career. You’re responsible for supporting their development. For a healthy discussion, it’s important to keep these boundaries. See our career conversation tips.
Before the meeting, ask your team member to reflect on four questions:
- What is your career goal? (This is where you want to be, in the future. It may be in 5-10 years time, or it may be the ultimate destination for your career.)
- What are the best possible next steps towards that goal, in terms of job roles? (There may be only 1 clear option, or there may be 2-3 possibilities.)
- What are your development needs, to prepare for your next role? (Try and be as specific as possible.)
- What’s the one development need to focus on, that will really make a big difference?
Some career conversation guides provide long lists of items to consider before the meeting. In our experience, this reduces the value of the preparation and dilutes the focus of the meeting. Just keep it focused on these four questions, there’s plenty to discuss!
You should also consider the same four questions, on behalf of your team member, to help you prepare for the meeting and the discussion.
Your company may also have job descriptions, career paths and competency frameworks that can help as part of the preparation for the discussion. If so, make sure you review these resources and share them with your team member too.
During the career conversation meeting
The main content of the meeting will be structured around the four key questions raised in the preparation. However, there are other important elements to consider too.
Setting up the meeting correctly
A venue that is ‘neutral’ is ideal, a meeting room for example. Don’t suggest a coffee shop (or any other open space) as the conversation should be private and confidential, open spaces don’t encourage that.
There are some key points that it’s useful to incorporate into the opening of the meeting:
- As the manager, your role is to provide development support. However, your team member is responsible for their own career.
- The main goal of the conversation is to discuss and agree what might be appropriate career moves and the development support that is required to prepare for these moves.
- Career moves must meet the needs of both the individual and the company, as a result they’re not guaranteed. This conversation is still valuable: the development activities that you agree will ensure that your team member is well prepared when career opportunities do arise.
Structure the meeting around the 4 key questions
The central content of the meeting should be structured around the 4 key questions:
- What is your career goal? (This is where you want to be, in the future. It may be in 5-10 years time, or it may be the ultimate destination for your career.)
- What are the best possible next steps, in terms of job roles? (There may be only 1 clear option, or there may be 2-3 possibilities.)
- What are your development needs, to prepare for your next role? (Try and be as specific as possible.)
- What’s the one development goal to focus on, that will really make a difference?
Start with big, neutral questions to encourage discussion.
It’s important that you invest time in answering each question thoroughly, before moving onto the next question. It may be that your initial conversations focus entirely on clearly defining your team member’s career goal!
Adopt a coaching approach to the conversation
There are three different roles that you’ll need to play in the meeting (try to be mindful of this as the meeting progresses).
Take a look at the following list:
- Your role as a coach: to ask coaching questions, encourage discussion and help your team member reach conclusions about their career and development needs.
- Your role as a manager: to represent the company and to advise your team member regarding what development opportunities may be available to them.
- Your role as a mentor: to share your experience about what has worked for you and how to successfully navigate through the company (both in terms of more formal systems, as well as more informal expectations).
Your primary role is that of the coach: to ask questions, to facilitate the discussion and guide your team member to a successful outcome. You may also need to give feedback to help your team member to better understand their current performance.
Part of your role as a coach is to ensure you have the right mindset. Are you genuinely interested in supporting the development and career progression of your team member? If not, I suggest you reflect on your role as a leader! One of the best things you can do (for yourself, your team and your company) is to nurture talent to progress up through the organization.
The outcome of the conversation should be to achieve clarity and alignment around the four questions.
Encourage your team member to think of their career as climbing a mountain, not climbing a ladder
It used to be that careers were like ladders, vertical steps up. That’s no longer the case, a better analogy is rock climbing.
This video builds on that analogy and makes the following points:
- You need a clear understanding of your goal
- There are countless ways of getting from Point A to Point B
- Your moves are influenced by many different factors
- There are safer and risker paths!
Take a look for more:
You may want to share this video with your team in advance of your conversations, as it will be a useful analogy to use in your discussions.
After the meeting
A successful meeting with drive several different actions, for both you and your team member. These actions are likely to fall into three different areas:
- Further career ‘research’ by your team member: these are further ‘exploratory’ actions as a result of the discussion. For example, you may recommend that your team member look at specific job descriptions that are appropriate next steps in their career. Or maybe you introduce them to someone from another function, to have an exploratory chat. Or maybe there’s an external, industry organization that could be a useful source of career insight. Whatever it may be, it’s your team member’s responsibility to follow up.
- Development action planning: in addition to these ‘exploratory’ actions there should be some specific development needs that are already identified. Your commitment is to support your team member with this development and this will require further follow up discussion.
- Schedule the next career conversation: finally, agree when will you get together to have another career conversation and schedule it. How soon this will be depends on the ambitions of your team member, be guided by their needs. Typically once a year is appropriate, but for team members who are ‘ready now’ it may be appropriate to meet every 6 months or even quarterly.
You can pick up on these actions in your regular 1-1 meetings with your team member.
In conclusion
Career conversations are a great way to engage and motivate your team members, while you’re supporting their development too.
Going into these conversations, it’s important that you have the right mindset:
- You’re there to support your team members, they’re responsible for their own career.
- Career progression depends on the needs of the organization as well as the needs of the individual.
- Success is achieved when opportunity meets preparation.
Use this career conversations guide as part of the rhythm of your team management. Once you get into the routine of having career conversations with your team they will be less daunting and you’ll see the benefits!
