the last word
Human resources professionals are the lifeblood of any or-ganization.
In this knowledge economy, HR is tasked with
managing an organization’s most valuable commodity –
its people. HR professionals often need to be recruiters,
marketers, coaches and counsellors; as more organizations seek to
embrace a career development culture, HR is tasked with that, too.
Yet, how many HR professionals take time to pause and reflect on
their career engagement?
Different from employee engagement, which generally fo-cuses
on the relationship employees have with their employers,
career engagement focuses on the relationship individuals have
with their careers. Optimal career engagement is realized when
challenge and capacity are in balance. However, when there is
too little challenge for the available capacity, individuals can be-gin
to feel underutilized. When there is too much challenge for
the available capacity, individuals begin to feel overwhelmed.
Without correction, full disengagement, and all it brings, oc-curs.
By identifying two routes to disengagement – either
through being overwhelmed or underutilized – the career en-gagement
model offers an important framework for career
conversations, and for considering interventions aimed at re-engaging
workers.
To begin, HR professionals may wish to explore how engaged
they are with their own careers. Has their level of passion, ex-citement
and energy stayed the same? Increased? Diminished?
Is there the right level of challenge and sufficient capacity (e.g.,
time, money, resources, skills) to deal with those challenges? If yes,
great news! Stay the course, but check in often to ensure chang-ing
circumstances aren’t negatively impacting opportunities for
career engagement. If no, reflect on whether there is too much or
too little challenge, resulting in either feeling overwhelmed or un-derutilized;
then, identify realistic solutions. For example, as it
can often be difficult to reduce the level of challenge, it may be
necessary to increase capacity instead. However, remember that
capacity relates to both individuals and organizations and in the
career engagement model, career is broadly defined (i.e., it is more
than just work). If the organization can’t help increase capacity,
consider whether personal supports (e.g., family) can help; reduc-ing
the pressures at home can help to “free up” the capacity needed
to deal with increasing challenges at work.
HR professionals can also consider these 10 strategies to
maximize career engagement – both for themselves and for the
employees they work so hard to support:
1. Provide motivating work
2. Offer meaningful opportunities
3. Recognize the importance of “work fit”
4. Equip supervisors to support employees’ careers
5. Strengthen co-worker relationships
6. Provide relevant resources
7. Continuously monitor alignment
8. Facilitate work-life balance
9. Respect work-life boundaries
10. Align challenge and capacity
Whether reflecting on their own careers or helping others,
HR professionals are encouraged to consider career engagement,
remembering that disengagement occurs in two distinctly differ-ent
directions – through feeling overwhelmed or underutilized.
Knowing the route to disengagement is key to designing interven-tions
and/or organizational supports. n
Deirdre Pickerell, PhD, CHRP, GCDF-i has over 20 years’ experi-ence
in the fields of career development, adult education, and human
resource management.
Bertold Werkmann/Shutterstock
Considering Career Engagement
KEEPING TRACK OF RELATIONSHIPS BETWEEN INDIVIDUALS AND THEIR CAREERS
By Deirdre Pickerell, Ph.D., CHRP, GCDF-i
64 ❚ JULY/AUGUST 2014 ❚ HR PROFESSIONAL