Self-Development using ReadytoManage Resources

More and more organizations are holding employees accountable for their own development, rather than simply sending people to classes. Many employees and individuals are eager to create their own development plans but don't know where to find the right resources or how to start.

Here's how we helped one company start down the self-development path.

We recently worked with a company who was looking to improve skills for some of their supervisors. Improvement of Supervisory and Management skills are some of the most frequent requests we get. The challenge was to create development plans that were targeted to each employee's needs, and could be undertaken on an individual, self-directed basis, while still being affordable. We had a few suggestions for this company to get them started on this path.

1. Do an assessment of each supervisory's current competencies. Each supervisor took the online Managerial Effectiveness Profile (MEP), which assesses the 12 most critical managerial competencies. Then Supervisors downloaded MEP output report which included detailed coaching tips for low areas and a development plan template to be used for designing a plan for competency development in two areas most in need of development over the next year;
2. Begin their learning journey with some basic development booklets. We created our library of highly affordable, downloadable Rapid Skill-Builder booklets just for this purpose. Each of these 42 booklets focuses on a key skill or competency, presents "best practice" thinking in just 12 pages, and includes an action template that can be used to apply concepts back on the job, again and again. In this case, each supervisor went to the RTM webstore and downloaded two Rapid Skill-Builder™ booklets to begin learning about the skill areas in which they had the greatest need. (Another great set of self-development booklets available at the ReadytoManage webstore is the Management Pocketbook series. These booklets are highly visual, practical resources on a wide variety of management and supervisory topics.)
3. Consider offering eLearning as a self-development tool Online learning can be a another excellent means of self-development for individuals. In our Rapid Skill Builder series of eLearning courses, we use an expert facilitator and video vignettes to demonstrate skills and techniques important to gaining mastery of the supervisory skill. eLearning can be made available to individual employees on an as needed basis, and can be undertaken at any time convenient to the employee. Most good courses allow you to start and stop from any point in the course, review previously covered material, and to download relevant resources such as cue cards, workbooks and action templates. The company in our example decided to offer each supervisor the opportunity to take an eLearning course from our online catalog, then followed up with some individual coaching by the manager.

For about $100 per person, this company was able to target specific skills that needed improvement and start employees on a self-development journey they hope will become a lifetime habit. Visit our webstore at http://www.readytomanage.com/ to view some of these self-development resources.