Career path coaching is more than just an integral part of your employee development. It’s also an important retention tool. By implementing career path coaching, you can encourage your high-achievers to remain for longer and decrease your overall training costs. Plus, you’ll have happier, more productive workers.

What Is Career Pathing? 

Career pathing, or career mapping, is a way of charting an employee’s career growth at your company. While you can design career paths so that they focus only on roles at your business, you can also expand the trajectory to include a progression that is outside of your company. 

This type of expansion is especially important for some of your top performers and executives. They might not have access to a higher position at your company. By career mapping roles outside of your company, you show that you’re committed to their long-term growth. 

Because you’re helping them do stretch assignments and other employee development to prepare for their long-term goals, these top performers will stay at your workplace for longer. Then, when they do decide to take the next step, you’ll be a part of the process instead of only finding out about it when they turn in their notice. 

At its heart, a career path is a roadmap for the employee’s career. Because each person’s career goals, abilities, and interests are unique, their career paths must be personalized as well. 

Do You Provide Career Path Coaching for Employees?

During Asure’s 2024 HR Benchmark Report survey, we asked 1,065 small businesses 40 HR questions on eight different topics. In our section on employee retention, we asked small businesses if they gave their employees career path coaching. Then, we took a look at what each company’s growth was like during the preceding year.

38% of zero-growth businesses said they provided career path coaching to workers.

78% of fast-growth businesses said they provided career path coaching to workers.

Out of the entire section on employee retention, this question had the largest spread. Fast-growth companies were far more likely to provide career path coaching to their workers.

The Top 8 Benefits of Career Path Coaching 

In a recent Mission to Grow podcast on “Employee Retention,” the vice president of HR compliance, learning, and development at Asure, Mary Simmons, talked about the importance of career pathing for retention. If a self-starter doesn’t know if they have a future at your company, they’ll start looking for another job when they decide to move up. “At that point, it’s probably too late to retain that person. And that’s how career pathing is tied directly to retention,” Simmons says. 

While retention is a major benefit of career pathing, there are other advantages as well. Sitting down and discussing your employees’ long-term career goals can help with succession planning, job satisfaction, and skill development.

1. Use Career Path Coaching for Better Succession Planning 

At any point, someone can retire, fall ill, or resign their position. When this happens, it is important to have a succession plan in place. 

With career path coaching, you’re already helping workers skill up and prepare for a future role in management. When a position opens up, these trained workers can instantly step into the available role. 

2. Help Workers Visualize Their Futures

If a go-getter wants a promotion or a role in management, they’re going to find a way to obtain it. Unfortunately, this often means your best workers will leave to pursue higher positions. Through career path coaching, workers can visualize a bright future with your business and know that they don’t have to leave to achieve their dreams.

3. Boost Employee Confidence

Discussing the future is a great confidence builder for employees. Your discussion shows them that you believe in their potential and are committed to helping them work toward a higher position. It can also lead to a higher sense of job satisfaction.

As a part of career pathing, you’ll also help your employees access new projects, stretch assignments, and development tools so that they can reach their goals. These milestone steps and training options will serve as confidence builders so that the employee can handle a new role when the opportunity opens up.

4. Get Workers More Invested in Your Company 

If a worker knows that they have a future at your business, they are far more likely to feel invested in your company. They’ll put in extra hours, spend time learning new skills, and look for process improvements because they know that they are valued and have growth potential.

5. Increase Employee Retention

According to Simmons, “Retention is very expensive. It’s two and a half times the cost of your employees. Fast-growth firms seem to understand that.” When you help workers visualize a future career path, they’re more likely to remain at your business for longer. This saves your business a significant amount of money on training and recruitment. 

Sometimes, the career path you create doesn’t involve a future at your organization. A talented chief operating officer (COO) may have nowhere to go, and they’ll likely look for a new company if they want a different job. You can acknowledge this fact when you discuss their career path. Then, show the employee what you can do to help them gain the skills they need to take the next step in their career. 

The COO from this example will still leave your company, but they may stay an extra year to get those extra skills and support. Not only does this give you an extra year with a highly skilled worker, but they’ll likely give you more warning before they leave and involve you in the decision. With highly skilled workers, any extra time you can get from them is a win.

6. Encourage Skill Development 

When an employee knows that they have a future to work toward, it encourages them to skill up. They’ll put more time into developing their skills because they know that there’s a purpose to learning new skills and working on stretch assignments. 

Plus, skilling up doesn’t have to involve an entirely new position or an expensive college program. According to Simmons, “There can be job expansion. You don’t necessarily have to promote the person for them to get more responsibility.” For example, you may place them in charge of client inquiries or give them a special project. 

7. Train Managers 

There are likely many different employees at your organization who are interested in taking on managerial positions. During career path discussions, you can find out who is interested in joining your leadership team. Then, you can give them additional training and support so that they can successfully take on an advanced role when one becomes available. 

8. Incorporate Mentorships 

Once you know where a worker wants to go in their career, you can also pair them with a mentor. 92% of Fortune 500 companies offer mentoring programs. In fact, 75% of executives credit a mentor with their career success. From improving employee satisfaction to helping workers succeed, mentorships can play an important role in your business. However, if you don’t know where an employee wants to go in their career, it’s hard to know which mentor someone should be paired with.

Prepare Your Workers for the Future

Whether you run a Fortune 500 company or a small business, career path coaching offers many important benefits. With career pathing, you can encourage team members to skill up and remain with your business for longer. When workers feel like a company cares about their future, they’re more likely to care about the company.

If you’re ready to take your business to the next level and learn about career path coaching, we can help. To find out more information, reach out to our small business HR experts today.