Career Advancement for Gurus not Managers
Our last blog post spoke about skills to master for those who want to move into management.
Now, let’s focus on an important concept for those who want to grow in their career, while not having a desire to go into management. This post is about the gurus at a company with advanced knowledge and skills who are not and do not want to be managers.
In most industries, the path for career growth is management. Over time, managers’ growth will involve oversight of larger teams, departments, or branches of a business.
Why is this a problem? Well it isn’t for many, but some of the best employees with the most to contribute do not desire to step away from their work to oversee others doing that work. For some, they desire growth within their position and skill set. They desire to become better at a job they are already good at and to hone their skills while obtaining new ones.
Now, many companies are recognizing the value of these career “Gurus.” As a result, intelligent businesses are developing career paths for their gurus.
These paths include development of the employee’s skills and abilities that are directly related to the tasks they perform. This is in contrast to the standard model of grooming performers to oversee and handle administration of others.
In my eyes, it could be a great detriment to a business to remove top performers from production that they are really good at to place them into management, where they may not even desire to be.
Fortune Magazine put out the following article based on an interview of Ryan Holmes, CEO of Hootsuite.
Read about Career Advancement for Gurus and try to understand whether you should be on a path to management or to becoming a guru.
Career Advancement for Gurus not Managers
Article by Mike Gamache
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