Can you share your experiences on what works in such a situation? Or perhaps what hasn't worked for you in this case?
How would you coach this individual?
Envision the Gen-Y knowledge worker or under-30 professional with less than 5 years of experience. This individual is consistently exceeding expectations in her role. In fact it's not difficult for this individual in this case because the functional aspects of the role are in some ways junior to her given abilities. She's driven to achieve, serve her customers and takes initiative. She continually seeks to address and resolve the uncertainties. Her fellow coworkers enjoy her presence and have a positive opinion of her work ethic and style.
However, she lacks the element of wisdom and maturity that we might agree comes from "time in the seat" and more years of experience dealing with challenging situations, interesting problems and difficult personalities.
This person has career ambitions for title and compensation in parity with her level of passion for her work. She sees herself as working at a level on par with that of colleagues in the same function, but significantly more experience.
Add to this leadership challenge the reality of the current organizational environment. The organization is shrinking. The primary strategy for retaining market value is to lower operating expenses over an extended period of zero growth in revenue. Requesting and winning bumps in title and pay for star performers has never been more difficult, let alone for a very junior colleague.
What would you do to coach this young professional? How would you keep them engaged and positive and understand that the reward will come, it's just too soon?
My approach would be to help this colleague find challenging projects and objectives that take them out of their comfort zone. If they succeed and have a net-positive level of success over a given period then they are rewarded. A shrinking organization can offer plenty of these opportunities if you're paying attention.
Envision the Gen-Y knowledge worker or under-30 professional with less than 5 years of experience. This individual is consistently exceeding expectations in her role. In fact it's not difficult for this individual in this case because the functional aspects of the role are in some ways junior to her given abilities. She's driven to achieve, serve her customers and takes initiative. She continually seeks to address and resolve the uncertainties. Her fellow coworkers enjoy her presence and have a positive opinion of her work ethic and style.
However, she lacks the element of wisdom and maturity that we might agree comes from "time in the seat" and more years of experience dealing with challenging situations, interesting problems and difficult personalities.
This person has career ambitions for title and compensation in parity with her level of passion for her work. She sees herself as working at a level on par with that of colleagues in the same function, but significantly more experience.
Add to this leadership challenge the reality of the current organizational environment. The organization is shrinking. The primary strategy for retaining market value is to lower operating expenses over an extended period of zero growth in revenue. Requesting and winning bumps in title and pay for star performers has never been more difficult, let alone for a very junior colleague.
What would you do to coach this young professional? How would you keep them engaged and positive and understand that the reward will come, it's just too soon?
My approach would be to help this colleague find challenging projects and objectives that take them out of their comfort zone. If they succeed and have a net-positive level of success over a given period then they are rewarded. A shrinking organization can offer plenty of these opportunities if you're paying attention.
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