How to Develop Employee Career Paths and Ladders

Today there are many reasons employees are leaving their jobs, but one reason is that they see little or no opportunity for advancement. Organizations can learn to retain employees by identifying career paths in which an employee can see himself as a part of an ever-growing company.
Employees want to know they have a place in a company’s future. By defining career ladders, specific roles, and identifying a clear career path, companies can retain quality employees and achieve steady growth.
Creating Career Paths
A career path is a solid foundation of concrete steps and instructions on how your employees can achieve their optimum role at your organization. 
One of HR’s central functions is to collaborate with the employee so that you both may identify the interests, experiences, and skills that can allow the employee to achieve their full potential. 
Creating a career path involves identifying benchmarks so employees know when they have achieved certain short and long-term goals. If the employee is able to achieve these landmarks then the organization can determine if they are right for advancement.
Developing Career Ladders
Career ladders describe certain roles within your company that an employee will perform as he progresses along the career path. For instance, an employee might advance from an assistant manager to an area manager and then to a senior manager.
There are several steps that can be utilized when developing career ladders:

1. Identifying a company’s structure. Knowing the kind of business hierarchy your organization is structured under can help plan the course of an employee’s advancement.
   
2. Knowing the requirements of each position. Knowing the particular requirements of each role within the company can ensure that employer and employee are on the same page. Knowing what is expected of each role, the responsibilities and goals of each, can help shore up the structure of any company.
   
3. Identifying what it takes to advance. Each career ladder must have a clear framework for what it takes to advance so each employee has a better understanding of what they need to achieve. For example, exactly how does an employee advance from area to a senior manager?
   

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