A Professional Development Plan May Be What You're Missing

By Jenny Barnes on Aug 09, 2023
3 min read 0 comment(s)

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More than ever before, companies across the globe are recognizing that their most important assets are their people. Investing in your employees is great for both your business and your staff, but did you know a professional development plan could be the stone you’ve yet to overturn in the quest to boost your bottom line?

In this blog, I’ll describe what I’ve noticed about companies who use a professional development plan as a key HR strategy (spoiler alert: it pays off!)

We’ll focus on what’s really important to businesses, how top organizations have used this planning approach to drive profits and how you can, too.

A Professional Development Plan Lets You Refocus on Core Business Needs

What are your business’ long-term goals? What are your short-term goals? You might already have a list—but do you know how you will get there, who will drive the initiatives needed along the way, and what skills they will need to drive them? The process of professional development planning will force you to map these items out, and then it will let you reap the benefits of excellent planning.

You might be wondering: what is a professional development plan? A professional development plan is your business’ strategic approach to aligning your employees' learning and growth with the company’s goals and overall mission.

Your professional development plan may have many sub-parts, depending on your objectives and your human capital makeup. Plans may include training programs, further education, hard skill development, boot camps, leadership workshops or one-on-one mentoring.

After you’ve identified what your business goals are and which staff members you’ll need in place to accomplish them, you can identify skill gaps and map out a plan to fill them (for example, with a few of the sub-parts listed above). Once you’ve aligned your employee growth objectives to your business goals in this way, you’ll be able to get more productivity out of your employees.

With professional development planning, staff will be working in sync, toward a purpose that can take the organization to new heights.

Career Trajectory Maps Improve Recruitment & Retention Efforts

One of the most common complaints you’ll hear in an exit interview is “I felt like I didn’t have room to grow here, so I started looking for another job.” While it’s hard to make an employee stay who is set on leaving, you can help alleviate this concern by showing your staff that you can, will and want to support their growth within your company.

Employees and job candidates appreciate clear communication about their career paths, and from the beginning of your company’s relationship with an employee (i.e., during the interview stage), you’re well served to explain the growth pattern your business leadership wants to develop for each role.

Even if you can’t promise promotion tracks on a specific timeline, employees like to know that they’ll be able to pick up new skills and add more value as their tenure increases.

Whether you’re using professional development planning as a tool to retain your existing employees or recruit new ones, it can be a powerful motivator. Both companies and employees alike benefit when an employee understands not only what they can do to be successful, but what they have to look forward to if they can master the first things on their plate.

Team members who believe that their professional development matches up with the company’s goals are more engaged, highly motivated and will be keener to stick around.

A Professional Development Plan Identifies the Most Useful Training Opportunities

One of the most important aspects of a professional development plan is identifying the most useful training opportunities for your employees. You may have a software engineer who is a fantastic writer and can help your marketing team understand the core of your product in a way that will bring new customers in droves.

You might have a line worker with leadership aspirations and fantastic natural motivational abilities. You may not know these things if you don’t ask, and what better way to ask than via a professional development planning session?

Getting started with professional training and development can be overwhelming. Even when a company has the best intentions, it can be tough to know exactly where to begin. Axcet HR Solutions, your Certified Professional Employer Organization, is here to help. We’re experts in training and development and can provide customized leadership training, development planning tools, coaching, and even interpersonal skills training for your promising team members.

Leadership training and development is just the beginning of what we offer at Axcet. To find out how we can help your small business, reach out to our experts today.