CAREER DEVELOPMENT IN A LEARNING ORGANIZATION

In case of learning organizations, consistency of the responses is again indicative
of the clear understanding of the employees about their career progression plan within
their organizations. The turnover tendency is low among the employees working in the
learning organizations. It is because of the employees’ clarity about their career path
while in the conventional organizations the turn over tendency is high because of the
ambiguities and inconsistency of policy regarding the career path of employees. This in
turn results in lowering their organizational commitment and increases turnover.
One of the conclusions drawn from this study is that almost all the individuals
have planned for their career and their stay with their organization is subject to this
planning. This means voluntary turnover is not impulsive but is caused when the
individuals see no match between theirs and organizational goals. To counter the
turnover, the organizations should be able to create a shared interest with the individuals.
In order to achieve long term association and be on the safer grounds, this shared interest
could be created by identifying a match between the individuals’ career development and
the organizational business strategy. Further more, the benefits should be clear to the
individuals as they may not be able to see it by themselves.
While analyzing the individuals’ expectation from the organization in terms of its
support to the process of career development, we conclude from this study that majority
wants that the organization should commit formally to such support. In this case, career
development activities such as mentoring, coaching, trainings, promotions opportunities,
on the job guidance and career counseling should be introduced into the organizations
through formal interventions.
It has also been ascertained that learning organizations’ context is more conducive
to the individual development as the career development activities are being practiced
commonly. If these activities are formally integrated in different development processes,
it would convey the message of a strong organizational commitment towards individuals’
career development ensuring long term association.
Besides these other development activities, we find that individuals consider
trainings as one of the major intervention for their capacity improvement. Besides
trainings, they have indicated other interventions for staff development such as guiding
and supporting colleagues in their work, sharing information gained through these