Advantages of Career Planning

Everything you need to know about advantages of career planning. The employees in an organisation work towards the achievement of the organisational objectives, but they themselves have their own personal goals, objectives and aspirations.

The organisation benefits in the long run if it satisfies the personal aspirations of its employees by taking suitable steps like career planning, even while keeping in mind the overall organisational objectives.

Career planning in organisational context means helping the employees to plan their careers with reference to their capacities, and involves devising a system of career movement and growth opportunities right from the time the employee enters the organisation till he ultimately leaves or retires.

Career planning is a developmental activity in other words, and involves spotting talents, nurturing it, deploying it and redeploying it. Career planning in its broadest sense is an integration of the personal goals of employees to overall organisational goals.

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Advantages of career planning to both employees and organisation are explained under the following heads:-

A. Some of the advantages of career planning to employees are as follows:-

1. Increases Productivity 2. Helps in Selecting Career Path 3. Ensures Self-Development 4. Fulfilment of Individual Needs 5. Sense of Affiliation 6. Opportunity for Optimal Returns 7. Awareness of Work Environment 8. Retains Control 9. Job Satisfaction and 10. Increase in Knowledge.

B. Some of the advantages of career planning to organisations are as follows:-

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1. Assures Availability of Talent 2. Helps of Attracting and Retaining Talent 3. Helps in Promoting Organisational Image 4. Protects Interests of Special Groups of Employees 5. Facilitates Staff Mobility 6. Availability of Qualified Personnel 7. Input in Programme Planning 8. Optimum Utilisation of Human Resources and 9. Prevents Organisational Chaos.

Advantages of Career Planning – To Employees and Organisation

Advantages of Career Planning – Top 7 Advantages

The employees in an organisation work towards the achievement of the organisational objectives, but they themselves have their own personal goals, objectives and aspirations. The organisation benefits in the long run if it satisfies the personal aspirations of its employees by taking suitable steps like career planning, even while keeping in mind the overall organisational objectives.

It is a progression of the career of young employees through various stages, from clerical to supervisory to managerial positions or form workers of lower skills to one of higher skills to supervisor to manager.

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A career is not just a job which is just a work experience, totally separate from other work experiences. A career is a sequence of different but related work experiences. There is a continuity about it. It makes the person’s life meaningful.

The different roles offered by a career means increasing levels of authority, responsibility, status and rewards. The individual moves in time and space in an organised manner. It answers the question. Where it will be five or ten years hence. Career planning is not an end by itself but is a developmental process and is significant as it helps obtaining optimum results while managing men.

Advantages of career planning:

(i) Career planning helps the individuals have the knowledge of various career opportunities, his priorities etc.

(ii) It helps him select the career which is suitable to his life style, preference, family environment, scope for self-development.

(iii) It helps the organisation identify talented employees who can be promoted.

(iv) Internal promotions, up gradations and transfers, motivate the employees, boost up their morale and also result in increased job satisfactions.

(v) Each employee will a wait his turn of promotion rather than changing to another organisation. This would lower employee turnover.

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(vi) Increased job satisfaction enhances employee commitment and creates a sense of belongingness and loyalty to the organisation.

(vii) An organisation with well-designed career plans is able to have a better image in the employment market and it will attract and retain competent people.

Advantages of Career Planning – To the Organization as Well as Individuals

The formation of career plans helps in shaping up the future plans of individuals with relatively more ease.

An effective career planning provides the following benefits/advantages to the organization as well as the individuals:

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i. Provides the individuals the knowledge of their priorities and various career opportunities.

ii. Helps the individuals to select the career that is appropriate to their life style, preference, family culture, and scope for self- development.

iii. Aids the organization to identify the talented and competent employees who can be promoted.

iv. Motivates the employees by boosting their morale. This results in increased job satisfaction by means of internal promotions, and transfers.

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v. Lowers employee absenteeism within the organization, as career planning ensures the employees about their career growth within the organization. Therefore, each employee waits for their turn of promotion rather than changing the organization.

vi. Improves the employees’ job performance by tapping their potential abilities and stimulating their personal growth.

vii. Increases the employees’ job satisfaction, which further enhances employee commitment and provides the employees a sense of belongingness and loyalty towards the organization.

viii. Contributes towards the individual and organizational development and effective achievement of the corporate goals.

ix. Enables the organization to build a better image in the employment market, which helps attract and retain the competent employees.

Advantages of Career Planning – With View of Employees and Organisation

Advantages of career planning as per the view of both employees and organisation is discussed below:

1. With the View of Employees:

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Career planning is of great importance to the employees for the following reasons:

(i) Increases Productivity:

Through proper career planning, an individual can ensure a work content liked by him.

(ii) Helps in Selecting Career Path:

Career planning helps an employee in understanding the career opportunities available in an organisation. A person comes to know in advance the level to which he can rise above and the potential and aptitude he has. This knowledge enables the employee to select the career most suitable to his potential and aptitude.

(iii) Ensures Self-Development:

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After becoming clear about his career path, an individual make concerted efforts to develop himself by using a variety of methods. This self-development based on explicit career path, takes the individual to a much greater height than what could have been possible otherwise.

2. With the View of Organisation:

Career planning is of great importance to the organisation as well, due to the following reasons:

(i) Assures Availability of Talent:

Successful organisations lay emphasis on growing new managers internally by promotion from within. For growing managers internally, these must be is a well worked out career path for every manager and every manager is developed to proceed effectively on this career path. From this point of view, organisation wide career planning becomes as essential pre-requisite.

(ii) Helps of Attracting and Retaining Talent:

Talented people can be attracted and retained in the organisation only when the organisation ensures them a bright future. This can be done, to a great extent, by effective career planning.

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(iii) Helps in Promoting Organisational Image:

Employees may be the best media to present the image of an organisation. The phenomenon of matching individual and job requirements emerges out of effective career planning.

(iv) Protects Interests of Special Groups of Employees:

As an organisation is a social entity, it is responsible to the society at large. Consequently, it has to take care of those social groups that are in disadvantageous position. The example are women, weaker section of the society, physically handicapped, ex-service men and so on.

There is a social necessity to bring these groups at par with others. From the organisational side, this can start at human resource planning followed by career planning and development.

Advantages of Career Planning

a. For Individuals:

(i) The process of career planning helps the individual to have the knowledge of various career opportunities, his priorities etc.

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(ii) This knowledge helps him select the career which is suitable to his lifestyle, preferences, family environment, scope for self-development etc.

(iii) It helps the organisation identify internal employees who can be promoted.

(iv) Internal promotions, up gradation and transfers motivate the employees, boost morale and also result in increased job satisfaction.

(v) Increased job satisfaction enhances employee commitment and creates a sense of belonging and loyalty to the organisation.

(vi) Employee will await his turn of promotion rather than changing to another organisation. This lowers employee turnover.

(vii) It improves employees’ performance on the job by tapping their potential abilities.

(viii) It satisfies the employee’s esteem needs.

b. For Organisations:

A long-term focus on career planning and development will increase the effectiveness of human resource management.

More specifically, the advantages of career planning and development for the organisations include:

(i) Efficient career planning and development ensures the availability of required human skill, knowledge and talent.

(ii) The efficient policies and practices improve the organisation’s ability to attract highly skilled and talented employees.

(iii) Proper career planning ensures that the women and people belonging to minority communities get opportunities for growth and development.

(iv) The career plan continuously tries to satisfy the employees’ expectations and as such minimises employees’ frustration.

(v) By attracting and retaining the people from different cultures, it enhances cultural diversity.

(vi) Protecting employees’ interest results in promoting organisational goodwill.

In addition to providing benefits, career planning presents certain limitations.

Some of the important limitations of career planning are as follows:

i. Non-Availability of Opportunities for Mobility – Makes the career planning unrealistic. Thus, career planning is suitable only in organizations where there is scope of both vertical and horizontal movement for employees, so that they get a holistic exposure.

ii. Changes in Environmental Factors – Influence the business of the organization and industry. In developing countries, such as India, the governmental policies change frequently. Therefore, career planning for a longer period of time may not be effective.

iii. Existence of Prejudices and Interventions – Makes systematic career planning difficult. For instance, favoritism and nepotism in promotions and political intervention in appointments influence and affect career planning.

iv. Lack of Scope in Some Jobs – Reduces the career advancements of the individuals as they cannot get promotions despite the required skills and effective career planning.

v. Decline in Career Opportunities – Results from the influence of technological or economical factors in certain job categories. For instance, computerization has resulted in the decline of career opportunities for clerks. The solution for the decline in career opportunities is career shift.

Advantages of Career Planning – To Individuals and Organisations

To Individuals:

(1) The process of career planning helps the individual to have the knowledge of various career opportunities, his priorities etc.

(2) This knowledge helps him select the career which is suitable to his life styles, preferences, family environment, scope for self-development etc.

(3) It helps the organisation identify internal employees who can be promoted.

(4) Internal promotions, upgradation and transfers motivate the employees, boost up their morale and also result in increased job satisfaction.

(5) Increased job satisfaction enhances employee commitment and creates a sense of belongingness and loyalty to the organisation.

(6) Employee will await his turn of promotion rather than changing to another organisation. This lowers employee turnover.

(7) It improves employees’ performance on the job by taping their potential abilities and further employee growth.

(8) It satisfies employee esteem needs.

To Organisations:

A long-term focus of career planning will increase the effectiveness of human resource management.

More specifically, the advantages of career planning for an organisation include:

(i) Efficient career planning ensures the availability of human resources with required skill, knowledge and talent.

(ii) The efficient policies and practices improve the organisation’s ability to attract and retain highly skilled and talented employees.

(iii) The proper career planning ensures that the women and people belonging to backward communities get opportunities for growth and development.

(iv) The career plan continuously tries to satisfy the employee expectations and as such minimises employee frustration.

(v) By attracting and retaining the people from different cultures, enhances cultural diversity.

(vi) Protecting employees’ interest results in promoting organisational good will.

Advantages of Career Planning – How is Career Planning Beneficial to Both the Individual and the Organisation?

Through career planning management can work out broad schemes and plans to suit mutual goals. Career planning provides a reasonable level of satisfaction for its employees and helps in a systematic growth of enterprise. In this connection, it may be pertinent to mention that the future of the employee or his growth has a direct one-to-one relationship with the growth of the company. Career planning directly flows from the overall corporate plan of the company.

Therefore, career planning is as such an important tool in the hands of the management for developing talents of its employees. Therefore, career planning is beneficial for both the individual and the organisation.

The advantages of career planning are classified as follows:

1. Advantages for the Individual

2. Advantages for the Organisation

1. Advantages for the Individual:

(i) Discovering own Talents – Career planning helps the employees to discover their own talents, needs, requirements and motives relating to their work and career. Thus through career planning an individual discovers himself.

(ii) Fulfilment of Individual Needs – Individual is able to fulfil his career needs and find out what will be his position in the organisation in the future. Individual career needs and interests are addressed efficiently through career planning.

(iii) Sense of Affiliation – Career planning provides a sense of affiliation with the organisation as it imparts a feeling among the employees that the organisation is interested in the individual’s development.

(iv) Opportunity for Optimal Returns – Career planning provides the opportunity to the individual to receive optimal returns for the contribution made by him in terms of talent, time and hard work in the organisation.

(v) Awareness of Work Environment – Career planning promotes more intelligent decision making with respect to careers and avoids frustration caused by lack of career information by providing the individual with greater awareness of his work environment.

(vi) Retains Control – In the increasingly complex and impersonalized modern industrial society, career planning helps to fulfil an individual’s need to retain a sense of control over his personal destiny.

(vii) Job Satisfaction – Career planning promotes job satisfaction among the employees as they are provided with projects, assignments, or work according to their interest and the career needs.

(viii) Increase in Knowledge – Career planning helps the employees to have an advanced knowledge about the present and future career opportunities, inside and outside the organisation.

2. Advantages for the Organisation:

(i) Increases Efficiency – Career planning helps in increasing the efficiency and productivity of the jobs. And greater creativity, motivation and contribution of the employees lead to the increase in effectiveness in meeting the organisational objectives.

(ii) Facilitates Staff Mobility – Career planning removes the obstacles which arise when staff is required to move on short notice. Assignments for the employees are planned well in advance so as to facilitate staff mobility.

(iii) Availability of Qualified Personnel – Career planning assures the organisation for adequate supply of qualified personnel for the future requirements on key positions in the organisation.

(iv) Input in Programme Planning – Career planning provides an added input in programme planning. It provides information regarding the capabilities of the human resources, with the help of which better judgement can be made regarding the accomplishment of the programme objectives.

(v) Optimum Utilisation of Human Resources – Career planning promotes the optimum utilisation of human resources both in present and future. In present, by preventing the instances of mismatched staff members, and in future, by implementing long-term planning for the development of the human resources of the organisation.

(vi) Prevents Organisational Chaos – Career planning prevents organisational chaos by providing more regulated, ordered and objective procedure for upward mobility of the human resources in the organisation.

Advantages of Career Planning – Explicit Career Path, Focused Self-Development, Assured Availability of Talent, Attracting and Retaining Talent and a Few More

The study of career and its planning takes a very different orientation, depending on whether it is viewed from the perspective of an individual or of an organization. A key question, then, in career planning is-with whose interests are we concerned? From an individual’s point of view, career planning is the process by which an individual selects his career goals and the paths to achieve these goals. Generally, this is known as individual career planning.

As contrast to this, from an organization’s point of view, career planning involves identification of individuals and charting out their career paths and designing an organizational system of career movement and growth opportunities for employees from the initial stage to the retirement stage.

This is generally known as career management. However, from the point of view of managing human resources, both contexts of career planning — individual career planning and organizational career planning—can be merged together. Career planning process is undertaken by both employees and organization simultaneously and career path for each employee is charted out by this exercise. Organization is as much responsible for career planning for employees as the employees themselves are.

Where individuals engage themselves in their career planning without reference to any specific organization such as lawyers, doctors, consultants, etc., who are engaged in pursuing their professions independently, career planning emerges as independent process.

In the organizational context, career planning is a joint process. From this point of view, career planning benefits both employees and organization. Let us go through these benefits.

I. Advantages of Career Planning to Employees:

In the present context, because of change in the perspective of criteria for measuring success, the role of career planning for employees has expanded. For example, Lancaster has viewed that career success may no longer be measured merely by an employee’s income or hierarchical level in an organization; career success may now include using one’s skills and abilities to face expanded challenges, or having greater responsibilities and increased autonomy in one’s chosen profession.

Contemporary employees seek interesting and meaningful work; such interest and meaning are often derived from a sense of being the architect of one’s own career. This can be achieved by career planning.

Career planning benefits employees, specifically, in the following ways:

1. Explicit Career Path:

Career planning forces employees to define their career goals more specifically. As a result, every individual willing to become an employee asks the question himself- what goals will he be able to achieve by joining a particular job? When will these goals be achieved, how will these goals be achieved? These what, when, and how taken together define the career path on which the individual should proceed to achieve his goals.

2. Focused Self-Development:

Contrary to popular belief that an organization develops its employees, the fact is that employees develop themselves more through self-development methods. Once an individual is clear about his career path, he can make concerted efforts to develop himself by using a variety of methods.

This self- development, based on explicit career path, takes the individual to a much greater height than what could have been possible otherwise.

3. Increased Productivity:

Career unrest, particularly in the form of career content unrest, that is, dissatisfaction with work content of the chosen career is a major source of decreased productivity. On the other hand, positive work content of the chosen career is a major source of increased productivity because work content is an intrinsic factor, and an intrinsic factor is valued more by people than an extrinsic factor.

They derive meaning out of what they do. On accomplishing the work, people develop a feeling that they have achieved something meaningful for themselves, organization, and society. This feeling leads to higher motivation to work, increased potential for self-development, and ultimately increased productivity. Through proper career planning, an individual can ensure a work content that he likes.

II. Advantages of Career Planning to Organization:

From an organization’s point of view, career planning has a long-term orientation for filling various positions from internal sources.

When this practice is followed, the organization derives the following benefits from career planning:

1. Assured Availability of Talent:

Successful organizations put emphasis on growing new managers internally by promotion from within. For growing managers internally, it is essential that there is a well-worked out career path for every manager and every manager is developed to proceed effectively on this career path. From this point of view, organization- wide career planning becomes a pre-requisite.

Changing human resource requirements over the intermediate and long term should be identified when the organization sets its long-term goals. Working with individual employees to help them align their needs and aspirations with those of the organization increases the probability that the right people will be available to meet the organization’s changing human resource requirements.

2. Attracting and Retaining Talent:

When Proctor & Gamble visits IIMs for campus recruitment, it furnishes a possible career path chart to each candidate to mark out his own career path. This is done with a view to attract talented candidates. Talented people are always scarce and they can be attracted and retained in the organization only when the organization ensures them a bright future.

This can be done, to a very great extent, by effective career planning. As more individuals seek jobs that offer challenge, responsibility, and opportunity for advancement, effective career planning becomes increasingly necessary. Not only career planning helps in attracting talented people, it helps in retaining these people by matching personal and work requirements.

3. Promoting Organizational Image:

Every year, some kind of survey is conducted by professional associations to identify the best employer in a country or in a geographical region. In this survey, high weight is given to “matching individual and job requirements.” The phenomenon of matching individual and job requirements emerges out of effective career planning.

In fact, employees are one of the best media to project the image of an organization. If their career is planned well, they will project good image of the organization. In alternative case, a bad image is created.

4. Protecting Interests of Special Groups of Employees:

An organization, being a social entity, is responsible for the society at large. Therefore, it has to take care of those social groups which are in disadvantageous position like women, weaker section of the society, physically handicapped, ex-service men, and so on. There is a social necessity to bring these groups at par with others.

From the organizational side, this can start at human resource planning followed by career planning and development. All these benefits resulting to an organization from career planning lead it to create and sustain competitive advantage for which every organization strives.