When trying to determine what the most important employee development goals are in a given situation, it’s hard to provide a blanket set of answers, because holy crap is this the biggest example of “every unique situation shapes this totally differently”. So, if you came here hoping for a basic set of best practices or commonly agreed upon goal sets, you’ll be sorely disappointed, because anyone who claims they can tell you that is full of it. There aren’t any.
But, at some point, there was nothing that currently exists, so I’m going to go out on a bit of a limb today, and talk about some general employee development goals (with no set strict parameters) that could possibly work for this kind of multi-industry standard. I can’t tell you specifics for when you’ve hit these goals, because that sinks right back into that murky sea of “it depends every time”.
The Benefits of Employee Development Goals
However, these general types of goals seem to be fairly common in most situations, if looked at broadly enough, so I’ll give you the best set I possibly can here. But, there’s only so much we can do with this, sadly.
One of the most important development goals is ultimately going to be the social aspects of employee working life. Your employees need to have a good sense of the value of team work and social dynamism. If employees cannot work as a unit, and put the group goals ahead of personal success or ladder-climbing, it creates a cutthroat environment where things aren’t done as well as they could be.
So, a solid capacity to work socially like this is a big goal with groups or individuals, because even with individuals, the team is still the greater concern, overall. You know you’re successful when there are no visible hitches in group dynamic.
A second important goal is an increased, broadened grasp of technology. Software and internet services are becoming bigger and bigger components of performing almost every form of work there is, and an increased grasp of technology, beyond the direct mechanics of routinely-used tools, is an important goal to strive for in all staff. Sure, software gets easier, but there’s a point of diminishing returns with simplification of those systems.
Finally, an overarching goal I should say is worth pursuing is a love for learning and improvement itself. Getting employees to value the idea of constant learning and instilling in them an innate initiative to continue learning and exercising their minds beyond requirements is a good way to cultivate growth in your company, and in your employees. It also makes future training, as well as change implementations quite easy and natural, as well, as it conditions employees to be open to alterations and refinements.
Employee development goals are relentlessly dependent, beyond this, on so many factors, such as your industry, your corporate culture, the department in question and a host of other things. So, this is the best I can give you – a set of overarching things that need to happen in order to ensure solidarity and to promote growth in the system itself, so it doesn’t have to be constantly stimulated. Related materials are available on employee development plan template page. Enjoy your reading.
