Sunday, June 19, 2011

Week 7 – Employee Development

Assignment Part One - Presentation: Based on your learning this week, develop a 5- to 7-slide PowerPoint presentation to your boss or to the head of human resources at your organization. Make a definitive case for a company-wide employee development plan. Be sure to make at least FIVE strong points about why employee development will be beneficial to the organization. Also include at least THREE types of employee development initiatives you are suggesting that the organization adopt. Lastly, be sure to reference one of the cases/examples from this week’s article, “Unleashing Positivity in the Workplace,” to help strengthen your case.
 
Employee Development Plan Presentation
 
References

American Society for Training & Development. (2008). Learning’s role in employee engagement. An ASTD Research Study. Retrieved from http://www.astd.org.

Employee Development. (2010). University of Minnesota, Office of Human Resources. Retrieved from http://www1.umn.edu/ohr/toolkit/development/index.html.

Noe, R. A. (2010). Employee training and development (5th ed.). New York, NY: McGraw Hill.

Pace, A. (2010). Unleashing positivity in the workplace. Training and Development, 64(1), 40-44).
 
Assignment Part Two - Personal Development Plan: Write your own personal development plan designed for you specifically and post it on your blog. Include the following components in your plan: (1.) Four types of development (from this week’s Learning Resources) that you will advocate for your employer to provide you and/or that you will pursue on your own (for example, continuing your professional learning outside of the workplace) (2.) A rationale for each of your development ideas
 
Personal Development Plan
CAREER PLAN
I am a partner in a training and development company with my sister. We are known for the integrity of our operations and the strength and power in which offer solutions to companies who are dealing with performance issues.
SHORT-TERM GOALS (1-2 YEARS)
BRIEF OVERVIEW
Areas of Interest / Position TitleCompetencies / Skills / Knowledge Needed: (areas to develop)
Training ManagerDevelop skills and work experience as an Instructional designer
Performance Improvement TechnologistDevelop Skills and work experience in the following areas:
• Conduct performance gap analyses
• Analyze the structure of jobs, tasks and content
• Analyze the characteristics of a learning/working environment
• Indentify and implement performance improvement interventions and strategies
• Evaluate performance improvement interventions
LONG-TERM GOALS (3-5 YEARS)
BRIEF OVERVIEW
Areas of Interest / Position TitleCompetencies / Skills / Knowledge Needed: (areas to develop)
CEO of Coaching For Power• Develop knowledge, skill and experience in all areas related to entrepreneurship and starting a business
• Develop skills in marketing and networking
• Develop additional skills in management
• Continue to develop skills as a coach/consultant
Renowned Motivational Speaker• Expand skills as a professional speaker
• Develop skills in marketing and networking
 
Access to Developing Skills

What forms of development will I pursue based on readings from this week’s resources

Formal Education: Given my current position at my company and the lack of employee development offered by my company, pursuit of formal education will continue to be something I pursue on my own time. I anticipate that taking a few business courses especially geared around entrepreneurship and starting a business would benefit me in developing the knowledge needed to effectively start my own business.

Transfer/Promotion: Imperative to my future as a CEO, I need to expand my skills in management and running a business as well as marketing. My current company is projected to experience exponential growth in the next six months. A transfer to the marketing division of my company or a promotion to Director of Sales would provide me new experiences and new levels of accountability.

Enlist a Mentor: Finding a mentor who has been successful in management or has been successful in creating his/her own consulting company would be beneficial to my ongoing development. Noe (2010), states “mentors provide career and psychosocial support to their protégés (pg. 373). Initially, if I were to stay with my company and accept a promotion, I would be interested in finding a mentor who has been successful as a director. As I expand my capacities and pursue my ultimate goal of having my own company, a mentor or coach who has created a successful consulting company would be advantageous.

Assessment Tools: There are a number of assessment tools that can be utilized to assess an individual’s strengths and weaknesses. In addition there are assessment tools which measure skills, personality types, motivation, work styles, oral communication skills, written communication skills, organizational ability, and leadership ability. I believe the use of some assessment tools would benefit me by offering me insight into what some of my strengths are, what some of my weaknesses are and which skills need further development and to what extent.
 
References

Noe, R. A. (2010). Employee training and development (5th ed.). New York, NY: McGraw-Hill.

Stolovitch, H. D., & Keeps, E. J. (2004). Training ain’t performance. Alexandria, VA: ASTD Press

1 comment:

  1. Marne,
    You did a good job on the blog assignment this week. Below are some comments on each part of the blog.
    Part 1: I liked the statement that you used to start your presentation. It would have been more effective if you could have cited a reference. I liked the way you related each benefit of employee development specifically to your company. Your suggestion of the value of cross-training employees is very good. Your themes of the proposal seem to be increased productivity and increased ROI. That could have been reinforced a couple of times throughout the presentation. I would have liked to have seen a couple of examples under each of the proposed initiatives. For example you could have listed university courses or consultant training under formal education. What are some of the assessment tools specific to your company that could be used to improve employee development?
    Part 2: You've set some hefty goals for yourself. I like the way you broke up your plan into short term and long term goals. Good process for analyzing your training needs; by starting with your long term and short term goals and deciding what knowledge and skills you need to reach those goals. Transfer and promotion, as you pointed out would be a good way of expanding your expertise and knowledge of the company. I would think that if this company is interested in developing your leadership skills they would pay for your formal education. Be careful in the selection of a mentor, they can be detrimental as well as beneficial in achieving your goals. Specifically which assessment tools would you select to benefit your development? I would have liked more detail in the rationale for each of your development initiatives.
    Mike

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