Thoughts on The Great Resignation and Developing Your Career
How Will The Future of Work Impact Career Development?
Learning how to effectively manage your career, or to take control of your career development is not an easy thing to do. I know this first hand from my own trials and tribulations in my career, which also caused me to start asking other people I know about how they learned to manage their own careers effectively. Through these conversations, most people have said to me one of 3 things:
I’ve learned it through making a lot of mistakes, and trial and error
I’ve learned it because someone taught me or coached me
I don’t feel like I’ve learned it yet
It was humbling and eye opening for me to learn through hundreds of conversations with people I would presume to be incredibly thoughtful and smart about their careers, that they too struggled with this. And not that I want to take solace in someone else’s struggle, but I think it helped me understand that this is just a topic that isn’t really taught to anyone before they jump into the workforce
Career Development in The Great Resignation
Even though many of us may have put career development on the backburner as a result of COVID-19, it’s hard to go a day without seeing a headline about “The Great Resignation” or “Great Reshuffling” that’s going on right now in the labor market. As a result of COVID-19, and many other factors such as greater power for employees, labor/wage shortages, and general re-evaluation of life priorities many employees, especially those who are highly employable or highly skilled are re-thinking career options and plans.
What is The Future of Career Development Looking Like For You?
As we enter this new world of work, I decided to ask some of the people about what they think about the future of career development, and what they expect to see happening based on what they think, as well as what they are seeing either in their company and amongst their peers.
Here are some of the highlights and learnings.
1)More Employee Empowerment
Much like the NBA, I think you will see more worker/employee empowerment. Software Engineers at some tech companies already have a lot of sway given their talents, but I see those on the business side having more options at employers, therefore giving them increased say. I also as more and more younger people enter the workforce, there will be more of this empowerment sentiment (Note: some might call it entitlement..) - Kevin, Tech
2)Flexibility as a bedrock of career choices
Flexibility will shape our careers. It'd be naive to think post-pandemic we'd either keep the same level of flexibility/autonomy as we have now or go 100% back to our previous work arrangements. The sweet spot is somewhere in the middle, but I believe it will be one that fortunately recognizes the importance of balance and flexibility. This isn't just work-life balance or physically where we sit, but rather an enhanced empathy and recognition of colleagues' whole-lives and the role work plays. - Blake, Consulting
3)More Resources to Retain Top Talent
I think people and teams will be given more of a responsibility to be able to spot and address burn-out of high performers. In the past, it's been encouraged but people are not always held accountable when they lose high performers. I think this will change as the competition for top talent is fierce and people are burned out after a year of working in the pandemic. It is critical for teams to understand - top performers do not demonstrate burnout the way that others do. Medium and low performers will demonstrate a lack of engagement and pull back on their work.
They will "signal" to the teams they are unhappy. Top performers, on the other hand, will often continue to deliver excellent output with a positive attitude. Managers often get their resignation, for a better opportunity, and are surprised because they seemed to be happy. I think people managing teams will be evaluated and incentivized based on their ability to build relationships with top talent, in a way that helps address this issue and helps the firm retain the best people. - Chris, Consulting
4) Breaks and Sabbaticals Become More Mainstream
I hope taking breaks to avoid burnout becomes normalized. This year was challenging for all of us. We saw the impact of constant stressors on mental and physical wellbeing. I wonder if, when travel becomes an option again and there are places for people to go, it'll become a trend to take extended vacations and extended time off to make up for the extreme pace of work over the last 1.5 years. Or maybe we'll all just normalize taking a month off to do nothing but read books and take it easy, just because. Let's make sabbaticals in early career a trend. - Jodi, Tech
5) Hierarchical or Companies/Industries will lose out on talent
I think industries and companies that tend to be more hierarchical when it comes to talent acquisition and people development are going A) have to shift where they hire or B) have to blow up their talent models or else risk a brain drain or serious attrition issue. For example, in CPG, many well-established CPG companies have more or less tried and true paths (ex: post-MBA you start as an Associate Brand Manager, then Brand Manager, etc) with set guidelines for how long you need to be in a role before you can get promoted. Most people who join these companies are smart enough to get jobs at other places, and don’t want to wait that long anymore to get promoted. Why wait 10 years to become a Director when you can do it in 5 at a DTC company or by moving into tech? - David, CPG Marketing
6) More Modes of Working For Highly Skilled Talent
COVID has accelerated so many remote/hybrid work trends across many industries, but I think what has the chance to be game changing for highly skilled employees is that it will open up access to opportunities that span beyond just working full-time for an organization. If you have a skillset that is in high demand, you could choose to work for a company full-time, and get great benefits and salary, but you could also choose to work as an independent consultant or freelancer and get more autonomy, flexibility, or in some cases, even make more money. Regardless, it means you have choice, not only for who you want to work for, but how you want to work. We already see this at times with highly specialized skill sets (ex: software engineers, highly paid consultants, creatives) but I think this will open up to even more individuals. - Corrine, Tech
7) Creation of Mid-Career Academies
I’m a self-proclaimed millennial, and for as long as I have been working, myself and my peers were never under the assumption that we’d work at the same company for our career, or for that matter, stick to the same profession. But now that myself and my peers have gotten older and entered in new phases of our life, I do wonder what will happen now that the rubber has met the road. For myself and some of my peers, we’ve worked hard in a profession, had some career success, and in many cases, gotten an advanced degree. But for many of us, we don’t envision working at our current company or current industry/role for the next 20-30 years, which on average is what’s left in our working years before we retire.
At this point, nobody wants to go back to school (I’m still paying off loans, its fine…) but I do think that there’s got to be another model for continued learning and growth. Switching careers is possible but not always easy, and some degrees (read: MBAs) do help you make those moves, but I could see a world where someone spins up Academy’s or “Boot Camps” for mid-career professionals to help them pivot into new careers. I think some MBA programs are trying this for their alums (not sure if they are any good) but given how many people are probably going to have to deal with this challenge, I could see some other opportunities in the market - Jamie, Corporate Law Firm
8) A New Employer-Employee Contract
Maybe I am being aspirational here, but I think there is going to be a new or revised employer-employee contract. It’s naive to think that things were great before COVID-19 and a lot of this goes back to the incentive structure of companies, leaders, and individual employees. But COVID-19 showed us just how broken the system was. This was especially true for how companies (and quite frankly, US Public policy) treats women and other underrepresented minorities in the workplace (I promise to get off my soapbox…)
I think companies are going to have to get more real and clear about what exactly they are providing to their employers and what in exchange they expect. Not only making it clear, but also updating it. For example, many employee benefit packages are based off of what employees needed in the 1970’s and 1980’s, and the times are a changing. We didn’t dare talk about mental health back then, whereas leading companies today are including mental health benefits as a basic part of their benefits package. - Jamie, HR, CPG
9) Internal Mobility is Back in Style
One thing I am already seeing is that within our company there has been a quick upsurge in our HR Department hiring. Across the board, they have hired for roles spanning learning and development, internal recruiting, and talent management. I’ve also antedotally noticed a lot more internal communications around internal career development programs, more stories promoting our internal job board, etc. I’m not sure if this is because we were previously understaffed or because we are trying to retain talent, but regardless of the reason it seems apparent that our company understands having top talent stay makes business sense, and a key to doing that is by investing in internal mobility and career development. I think this is a net positive overall, but it is interesting to see because for so long companies seemed to prioritize just continuing to hire from the outside. The irony of it all is that at least in my parents generation, internal mobility and employee development was pretty common. It just goes to show you “what’s old is new again…” - Julie, Tech
Conclusion
Career development isn’t always easy but it also can be an exciting time and opportunity to try new things or work toward your career goals. Given the change and unrest that has occurred in our lives over the last 18 months, now is as good of a time as ever to reflect on where we are, and where we might want to go.
A Special thanks to all that contributed to this post! If you are reading this and have any thoughts, drop me a line (alex.dea@gmail.com)
Additional Reading and Resources