Embracing Employee's Uniqueness by Implementing Individual Development Program

Christine Vergos, Director of Human Resources, The Beck Group

As our Chief People Officer, Christine is responsible for leading, fostering, and supporting Beck’s employee experience. With over two decades of practice in HR, she brings deep knowledge of best-in-class people programs, resources, and total rewards. Christine is more passionate and focused on employee experience and talent development.

What are the challenges that you have seen as a Chief People Officer in the organization?

I believe that talent assessment is a challenge for most businesses for various reasons. One reason can be that they lack a process for talent reviews that is clear to participants or the framework of an HRA system. Another challenge is succession management, which many businesses encounter.

They work to quickly identify the replacements that can fill openings when they occur. At Beck Group, we employ the 9-Box grid as a tool in succession planning to evaluate an organization’s present talent and identify potential leaders. This exercise is typically performed once a year. However, HR leaders and organizations that get it right can go beyond a year to think about the performance and the potential of their employees. They take into account what each person will require in order to succeed at the next stage of their career.

Do you want to talk about any trends that are in place to solve those challenges?

In the past, businesses developed everyone in the same way, but today they go beyond just individualizing development. Therefore, I think that’s a pretty encouraging trend.

“We’re thrilled to introduce the idea of individual development to an employee to let them know that we have thoughtfully considered their plan to assist their continuing improvement”

Another pattern is the prevalence of leadership development initiatives within organizations. Most companies used to view this as a nomination procedure, but this actually led to a scenario of haves and have-nots, where those who wanted to be developed were left out, and those who were included in the program may not have truly wanted to be there. Therefore, moving away from nomination and adopting a development for all models approach is more inclusive that businesses are clinging to.

Is there any project where you have utilized any of the above-mentioned trends?

When I started working for Beck Group, they routinely requested each employee to write their five-year plan. On the one hand, it’s beneficial for employees to consider their growth plans, but on the other, leadership thought about prospective career alternatives for each person was lacking. As a result, I intend to introduce the idea of individual growth planning along with my team. We’re thrilled to introduce the idea of individual development to an employee to let them know that we have thoughtfully considered their plan to assist their continuing improvement. The main project on which we have been concentrating is that. That’s the biggest project we are currently focused on.

We will also re-launch our leadership development program to support newly promoted employees in developing their abilities and emerging professionals in order to address the foundations of fund management. Therefore, there may be more managers in their early careers who require some  leadership principles. Additionally, there is a coaching component in that part that can greatly aid in focusing on individual development through personalized coaching.

How do you envision the future of organizational change management?

I believe that HR and their role will shift more toward skilling, up-skilling, and re-skilling employee to provide an organizational competitive advantage. Thus, talent assessment and succession planning are essential to support every organization or business in order to prepare and align for the growth they anticipate. If you don’t have the necessary people pipeline and succession, your organization is at risk. It’s a good trend that HR is becoming more and more recognized as a key business partner.

What would be your single piece of advice to the upcoming professional?

Even though these are crucial to employee relations, I admit that I was a little hesitant to enter organizational development early in my career and fully grasp the significance of talent and performance management. I would advise the earlier career professional, organizational development, or talent management professionals to keep asking them questions in order to expand into those fields that are actually adding strategic value to the organization.