Employees change their career path for reasons such as passion, opportunities, and interests. Companies need to prepare to support this career transition in order to improve the efficiency of the organizations. One of the most effective ways to support this transition is through learning and development. This year\u27s Global Human Capital Trends survey shows that more than 85 percent of respondents cited learning as  important  or  very important.  Yet, more companies than ever report that they are unprepared to meet this challenge [1]. To close gaps between career transition needs and lack of preparation in organizations, HR professionals and learning specialists are being asked to offer better learning platforms and products that meet new expectations of employees for on-demand learning opportunities

Jin, Sanghoon

Kim, Hee Kyoung

English

DigitalCommons@ILR

Cornell University ILR School 
DigitalCommons@ILR 
Student Works ILR Collection 
Spring 2015 
How Can Learning & Development be Applied to Support 
Employees' Changing Career Paths? 
Sanghoon Jin 
Cornell University 
Hee Kyoung Kim 
Cornell University 
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How Can Learning & Development be Applied to Support Employees' Changing 
Career Paths? 
Abstract 
Employees change their career path for reasons such as passion, opportunities, and interests. Companies 
need to prepare to support this career transition in order to improve the efficiency of the organizations. 
One of the most effective ways to support this transition is through learning and development. This year's 
Global Human Capital Trends survey shows that more than 85 percent of respondents cited learning as 
"important" or "very important." Yet, more companies than ever report that they are unprepared to meet 
this challenge [1]. To close gaps between career transition needs and lack of preparation in organizations, 
HR professionals and learning specialists are being asked to offer better learning platforms and products 
that meet new expectations of employees for on-demand learning opportunities. 
Keywords 
human resources, learning and development, training, learning, career path, workforce training 
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ILRHR 6640: Online Research & Reporting for HR 
Sanghoon Jin & Hee Kyoung Kim April 10th, 2015
Executive Summary
Final Question
• How can Learning & Development be applied to support employees' changing career path?
• What are some leading edge L&D approaches that companies are using to train their workforce? Include 
case studies if possible.
Introduction
Employees change their career path for reasons such as passion, opportunities, and interests. Companies 
need to prepare to support this career transition in order to improve the efficiency of the organizations. One of 
the most effective ways to support this transition is through learning and development. This year's Global 
Human Capital Trends survey shows that more than 85 percent of respondents cited learning as "important" or 
"very important." Yet, more companies than ever report that they are unprepared to meet this challenge [1]. To 
close gaps between career transition needs and lack of preparation in organizations, HR professionals and 
learning specialists are being asked to offer better learning platforms and products that meet new expectations 
of employees for on-demand learning opportunities.
Theoretical background for career path
When people decide to change their careers, they consider various factors in a complicated mechanism. Over 
the last decade, two new perspectives on career changes have emerged and become popular in the 
organizational literature: the protean career model and the boundaryless career model.
1) The protean career model
The protean career centers on the conception of psychological success resulting from individual career 
management, as opposed to career development by the organization. A protean career has been characterized 
as involving greater mobility, a more whole-life perspective, and a developmental progression. In more recent 
renditions of the protean career model, some scholars have characterized it as involving both a values-driven 
attitude and a self-directed attitude toward career management.[2][3]
2) The boundaryless career model
The boundaryless career refers to the notion that today's professionals manage their own career paths, as 
they seize new and often different job opportunities to obtain training, enhance their human capital, and 
remain marketable. Thus, rather than remain with one organization and line of work over the course of their 
careers, individuals self-manage their careers by autonomously capitalizing on new opportunities that they 
believe will provide them with valued returns in exchange for performance. [4]
These two theories help explain the mechanisms that influence an individual's career path. There are several 
ways that learning & development can support employees based on what can be learned from these career 
transition theories.
Learning & Development trends in workforce training 
Competency-based Training [5]
Competency-based training fits well with personalized learning. It brings increasingly scarce training 
resources to the persons that need it the most and avoids subjecting people to training that they really don't 
need. Competency-based training can lead to improvements in productivity and also integrate very well with 
other HR disciplines such as recruiting and selection, performance management, succession planning, and 
compensation. Competency development can also be linked to organization capabilities and to organization 
strategy.
Corporate MOOCs [6]
The MOOC learning experience can be re-imagined to serve the learning needs of corporations. Some 
companies utilize MOOCs to meet their business challenges. In December 2014, Microsoft trained more than 
850 sellers with an eight-week customized online course. The result was outstanding: an 85 percent of 
completion rate and a 95 percent of satisfaction level with a low dropout rate. This course was developed in 
partnership with INSEAD and Intrepid Learning Inc. The secret of success was that the MOOC was well tailored 
to company objectives, embedded in the corporate context, and designed with learner engagement and 
motivation in mind.
Social Learning [7]
Social learning can be defined as the acquisition of knowledge and skills through methods that are 
collaborative, immediate, relevant, and presented in the context of a personal work environment. Social 
Learning incorporates social media, gaming, real-time feedback, and advanced on-the-job methodologies. To 
develop social learning in an organization;
• Recognize the potential of user-generated learning content.
• Create organizational social media platforms to harness the power of interactive learning.
• Understand that the line between working and learning is becoming increasingly permeable. Learning 
is becoming more important with the pace of knowledge creation.
• Respond to the millennial generation's need for development.
Benchmark 
Cisco [8]
The company was interested in building a learning-solutions center: a place where you find what you need in 
order to do your job better. The learning model at Cisco distinguishes between "structured learning" and 
"emergency learning," and tries to customize each form of learning to the needs of the individual. In the ideal 
learning environment, each person will be able to create a customized web page, tentatively called My Future. 
The My Future page will serve as a learning portal.
Google [9]
Google's Googler-to-Googler program is a great example of how companies promote a learning culture by 
unleashing the power of its own experts. Google taps its employees to teach career-building classes as extra 
curriculums. Giving employees teaching roles helps to develop a learning culture in which employees work 
together.
Conclusion
The protean and boundaryless careers models are still developing and there are many factors which impact 
their adoptability and implementation. Nevertheless, they are important concepts and have implications that 
should be considered. Based on these theories, HR professionals should integrate learning and development 
with the overall talent-management system including career paths. Technology will be used to help guide 
learning engagements, expand access to the accumulated knowledge base, and track progress toward closing 
critical competency gaps.
References
[1] Deloitte. (2015). Global Human Capital Trends 2015. Deloitte University Press. p25.
[2] Briscoe, J. P., DeMuth, R. L., & Hall, D. T. (2006). Protean and boundaryless careers: An empirical exploration, 
Journal of Vocational Behavior 69, p30-47
[3] Banks, C. H., Nafukho, F. M. (2008). Career Transitions Across and Within Organizations: Implications for 
Human Resource Development
[4] Cheramie, R. A., Sturman, M. C., & Walsh, K. (2007). Executive career management: Switching organizations 
and the boundaryless career, Cornell University
[5] Rothwell, William J. (2010). Competency-based training basics. Alexandria, VA. ASTD Press.
[6] Fourrage, Ludo. (2015). Training. Mar/Apr2015, Vol. 52 Issue 2, p50-50. 1p.
[7] Meister, Jeanne C. (2010). The 2020 Workplace. Pymble, N.S.W., Australia ; New York, N.Y. : HarperCollins.
[8] Muoio, Anna. (2010). Cisco's quick study. Fast Company.
[9] Kessler, Sarah. (2013). Here's a Google perk any company can imitate: employee to employee learning. Fast 
Company.


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