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Career Planning for Employee Development: A Primer for Managers
Bowen, Donald D., and Douglas T. Hall
20/2  (Winter 1977): 23-35

This paper examines briefly some behavioral science research and theory bearing upon the subject of career planning and then describes alternative career planning techniques and evaluates each in terms of the requirements and criteria developed from the research and theory. There are distinct advantages to the organization which actively supports career planning on a regular periodic basis. Comparing the do-it-yourself approach, various forms of counseling or coaching strategies, and the use of career planning workshops, it can be recommended that management seriously consider the workshops. The argument favoring the workshops rests primarily on the capacity of these types of programs to provide the support, feedback, modeling, and opportunity to experiment, conditions which are critical to a person's development. It is also important, though, that management insists upon research to evaluate any kind of career intervention attempted. Organizations that decide to take the lead in experimenting with this rather new technique may gain a considerable competitive edge in learning how to use their people more effectively and profitably by releasing the potential available when each employee becomes a more effective manager of his or her own career.

 

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