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Development Center
Talent has to be nurtured. Talented employees should be supported and stimulated. In a development center, you can assess your company’s human potential, determine whether it can grow in another position or occupy critical company positions. As with assessment centers, a development center has employees participate in simulations, surveys and interviews. This provides insight into the employee’s ‘strengths and weaknesses profile’ and career ambitions. Acerta is an expert in setting up customised development centers that are part of a motivating, orienting trajectory.
Preparation
At Acerta, we are convinced that a development center can only be successful as part of an integrated strategy. A thorough preparation is essential. During the preparation stage, employees should be made aware of the objective of such a center and of the ‘bigger picture’. This implies that, alongside competences, significant attention is paid to an employee’s personality and ambitions. By indicating that you care about your employees’ personal goals and interests, you stay a step ahead of the competition. Your employees will feel appreciated, will be more aware of their career goals and will be more motivated to put in the extra effort to meet those goals.
While the development center is mainly aimed at assessing employee competences (‘ability’), the surrounding activities strongly focus on what employees want (‘ambition’) or on who they are (‘personality). One of our tools for identifying ambition and personality is based on Edgar H. Schein’s eight career anchors. A straightforward survey provides useful insights into your employee’s most prevalent motives and potential career choices. You can also ask your employee to assess his or her own competences. In addition, 360° feedback further contributes to an in-depth employee assessment as it provides a nuanced view on how the employee demonstrates critical competences in his or her current job. At this stage, not only the employee itself but also peers, direct and indirect managers and other staff members complete a targeted, online survey. This multi-source feedback provides insight on how employee competences are perceived by others in the organisation. It is an effective way to monitor whether an employee is result-oriented, how he or she interacts in the workplace and how he or she meets set objectives. This allows employees to check their self-assessment against the perception of colleagues, direct reports and supervisors.
This thorough preparation provides the employee with valuable information on his or her personality, ambitions, interests and motives − even before development center activities have started.
Development center
A reference profile is outlined to determine which competences should be assessed in the development center . This profile is associated with a particular function, a specific level or a role that the employee may take up in the future. During the development center, employees are mostly given the opportunity to demonstrate competences that they do not yet (fully) master today, but may need tomorrow.
By setting up development center activities for your business, we stimulate you to actively screen for employee talent. We do not so much focus on competence weaknesses but aim to identify existing strengths. This positive, appreciative approach is highly motivating and contributes to business success.
Feedback & Integration
When the development center activities are completed, a feedback and integration interview is conducted. During the interview, we not merely discuss the development center results. The information collected at the preparation stage is used to obtain a clear picture of talents, competences, motives and career ambitions.
Foundation for a personal development plan
In a next step, the results are discussed with all parties that will be involved in further employee development: the employee itself, management and the HR department. The aim of the discussion is to set priorities for the employee’s development to translate them into concrete actions (‘SMART’) in a personal development plan. If required, Acerta can assist you with the execution of such plan. You can find more information on this in the section Personal Development Plan.
