Helpful summary

• Overview: We explore the essential steps to create an effective people development plan, emphasizing how to nurture employees and develop their skills.
• Why you can trust us: We have a wide range of people development mentors who have helped organizations discover and harness the potential of their employees. MentorCruise success stories from mentees like Tom Ray and Clara Chaouat showcase how our platform helps individuals achieve their goals. 
• Why this is important: A well-structured people development plan is crucial for enhancing employee engagement, performance, productivity, and retention rates, preparing a future-ready workforce.
• Action points: Our guide covers identifying skills gaps, aligning employee and company goals, leveraging development plan templates, and customizing learning opportunities, among others.
• Further research: MentorCruise offers mentorship opportunities with experts like Miky Bayankin to further personalize and implement successful people development strategies.

Empower your team with a people development plan

In this MentorCruise guide, we'll explore the key steps and best practices to create a tailored plan that empowers employees to reach their full potential. And the side effect? Your company achieves its objectives faster.

Let’s get started!

Why listen to us?

At MentorCruise, our first-hand experience in fostering people development shines through our diverse success stories. 

From early-stage professionals to seasoned tech veterans, our mentorship platform has catalyzed career transformations across the board. 

What is a people development plan?

Also known as a professional development plan or an employee development plan, a people development plan provides focus and direction so individual employees in a company can achieve their long-term goals, whether their personal goals or what they want to attain in their careers.

Benefits of creating a people development plan

Devising an effective people development plan helps you:

• Increased employee engagement - Tailored development plans demonstrate commitment, fostering a sense of value and purpose among employees, driving engagement.
• Enhanced performance and productivity - Targeted development initiatives improve skills and competencies, leading to higher levels of performance and productivity within teams.
• Improved retention rates - Investing in employees' growth and career advancement increases loyalty and satisfaction, reducing turnover rates and retaining top talent.
• A future-ready workforce - Continuous learning and development prepare employees for evolving roles and challenges, ensuring organizational adaptability and competitiveness in the market.

How to create the perfect people development plan

Here’s your step-by-step guide to creating an effective people development plan. 

Step 1: Start everything with a skills gap probe

The very first step in creating a people development plan is to figure out the areas where you need to upskill your employees. You may need to conduct a training needs analysis to help you ascertain which skills are missing, or underdeveloped, and which employees need immediate training. 

This probe places your organization’s goals at the forefront of your plan. By finding out which aspects you are already doing well and which need work, you can streamline your training efforts for maximum benefits. 

MentorCruise mentee Egle Zuzeviciute was able to bridge her skills gaps with the help of the platform. During that time, she started her job in the product marketing department at Exacaster, a big data and AI company based in Lithuania. However, she was doubtful about her skills for the job. 

So, browsing through MentorCruise, she decided to get mentorship from Lloyd Jacob, who is also a startup founder.

A few weeks into the mentorship, she learned about her own role and how to manage it, therefore mending her skills gap. She said the mentorship gave her “a boost of fresh air and new ideas on how to improve your work and contribute to [the] company’s goals.”

Step 2: Identify employees for leadership and career growth 

Next is identifying which of your employees are eager to learn and looking for growth opportunities. Focus your initial efforts on them as you build their current skills, and invest in management and leadership training when they’re ready. 

This also is beneficial for your company as employees who feel they are getting the help they need to develop their career goals are more likely to stay in the team, helping you retain your most talented people.

For example, leaders at Atlassian advocate for creating an environment of trust and open communication, championing team achievements over individual accomplishments.

Step 3: Align your employees’ goals with your company’s goals

Once you have determined the areas that need action and employees interested in growing at your company, ensure that your goals for both these things are connected. 

Remember, a people development plan can only go far if you consider not just the career goals of your employees but also those specific to your company to reinforce career succession plans. 

To measure how satisfied your employees are with their jobs, conduct discussions. You’ll find out what they need, what they wish to learn, and how they want to learn them.

Step 4: Help your employees grow with you

The perfect people development plan shouldn’t just focus on your company’s growth opportunities, but also where your company and industry are growing. 

Ask yourself these questions:

• Where do you want to see your company in the next five years? Ten years? Twenty years? 
• How many leaders do you need to train to achieve that vision?
• Are there people in your team right now who are ready to take your business to the next level? 

Mentees who have found guidance from MentorCruise share experiences of gaining confidence, achieving career goals quicker than anticipated, and making substantial advancements in their careers. Their relationships with the platform’s mentors demonstrate the importance of fostering employee development that complements both individual and organizational objectives. 

Enterprises and their HR departments have benefited from hiring mentors for their teams. With MentorCruise, you can get assistance with people development and management. Mentorship improves retention, satisfaction, and skill in the workplace. 

Step 5: Take advantage of people development plan templates

You don’t need to implement a people development plan from scratch. Just use our template.

Here are the things that you should include  in your people development plan template:

• Employee information: Their names, positions, and departments.
• Assessment of current skills: Summary of existing skills and competencies.
• Development objectives: SMART goals aligned with both individual career aspirations and organizational needs.
• Planned learning activities: Detailed actions to achieve objectives, such as training programs, workshops, mentoring, or on-the-job experiences.
• Resources required: Identification of necessary tools, courses, or support.
• Timeline: Clear deadlines for each objective and activity.
• Success metrics: Criteria to evaluate the effectiveness of the development plan.
• Review dates: Scheduled meetings to assess progress and adjust the plan as needed.

Use this template as your guide to help you customize the plans for your individual employees and your company, overall.

For more detail, take a look at the people development plan template of The University of Reading. Its template emphasizes reflection, goal setting, and recognizing achievements. It also suggests improvements, like aligning personal and organizational goals. 

Step 6: Tailor and fit the learning opportunities to the training

Now that you have a template to work on, you must also make sure that your employee training matches your objectives. 

There are various methods to deliver various goals. For instance, leadership training can focus on these approaches. 

• Mentorships
• Coaching
• Cross training
• Job shadowing

For skills-based learning opportunities, your approaches could either be:

• On-the-job training 
• Microlearning 
• Augmented reality

Once you have a good grasp of where your company is headed through these data and which employees are willing to undergo the process of training, you can utilize those training tools for outstanding results.

One of the most widely recommended approaches to deliver your company’s goals and vision, such as during your leadership training, is mentorship. Should you need experienced mentors for your people development, connect with them using MentorCruise. 

This platform facilitates people development with the help of mentors who offer personalized guidance, skills enhancement, and career advice across various fields, fostering professional growth and success.

Among those mentors for this purpose is Miky Bayankin, a seasoned entrepreneur who has guided mentees looking to level up their leadership skills and empower their teams. Try MentorCruise today or you can start with a no-obligation trial period.

Step 7: Track your results using data

Coming up with the right people development plan is just part of the entire process, a piece of the pie. The next step is also about knowing whether it is working. Thus, you should take time to track the success of your effects and if there are things that need troubleshooting, remedy them. 

You can meet with your employees to see how everything is going and get their feedback on what else they want included. You may also identify the obstacles. 

Moreover, as a company, ensure you have somebody or a group of people assigned to monitor the success of your people development plan. 

Companies like Etsy and OverDrive offer personalized development opportunities, empowering employees to learn from others and track their progress through professional growth planners.

Best practices for creating a people development plan that works

Here are the best practices to consider when creating an effective people development plan. 

• Create SMART goals. SMART (specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound) goals will help employees understand what their career aspirations are and the steps needed to be taken to achieve them.
• Build achievable, realistic milestones. Aside from building SMART goals, you should also create achievable milestones, such as what you’ll focus on in the short term to achieve what you want in the long term. 
• Stick to a schedule. One mistake that managers commit is spending much of their time implementing people development while neglecting the more important tasks at hand in the company. Make sure to schedule people development alongside your other tasks.
• Listen to both positive and negative feedback. Feedback from your employees is also crucial to determining the course of your people development strategy. However, feedback can be both positive and negative. Don’t just work on the negative feedback. You must also invest your time doubling down on the positive feedback.
• Align employee and company goals. It is also important that the goals of your company are aligned with the personal aspirations of your employees.

Conclusion

By implementing our strategies for people development, companies can cultivate engaged, skilled, and resilient teams. It’s one of the highest ROI investments you can make.

When you need to create an effective people development plan and enact it, you can find a mentor on MentorCruise who specializes in your desired field of expertise. Connect with our experienced mentors to create and execute a comprehensive people development plan that propels your organization to new heights. 

Seize the opportunity for growth and unlock your company’s full potential with MentorCruise!