zavvy logo
Solutions
Preboarding and onboarding
Onboarding
& Preboarding
Preboarding
Close the gap between signing and start
Onboarding
Wow new hires without getting lost in busywork
Event Scheduling
Automatically manage your orientation events
Development & skills
Development
& Skills
Career Frameworks
Create role clarity with transparent career pathways
Growth Plans
Combine goals with measurable action
Skills Matrix
Understand everyone's strengths and opportunities
Training & Knowledge
Training
& Knowledge
Learning Management
Create and manage engaging courses
Training Library
Find the right resource for everyone
Power Skills
Find expert-led, high impact training programs
Performance and feedback
Performance
& Feedback
Performance Reviews
Measure performance without the bias and act
360° Feedback
Run any kind of feedback process
1:1s
Align people managers and reports through structure
engagement & people analytics
Engagement
& Insights
Engagement Surveys
Understand your people and engage with precision
Connection Programs
Strengthen relationships with regular meetups

Platform

|

Consultation

|

Integrations
Customers
Templates
JourneysFeedbackTraining Library
IntegrationsPricing
HR Insights
BlogCommunityTemplates & PlaybooksReal-life HR Examples
Login
EN
EnglishDeutsch
LoginLogin
See it in action
Login
Settings and language
Language
EnglishDeutschSign in
Login
Try for freeGet a demo
zavvy logo
Lösungen
Preboarding and onboarding
Onboarding
& Preboarding
Preboarding
Schon vor Tag 1 begeistern
Onboarding
Schneller und besser einarbeiten
Meetings
Onboarding-Events ganz automatisch managen
Development & skills
Entwicklung
& Skills
Karriere-Frameworks
Klare Karrierepfade für alle anbieten
Entwicklungspläne
Ziele mit messbaren Maßnahmen verbinden
Kompetenzmatrix
Mit tiefen Insights Potenziale aufdecken
Training & Knowledge
Training
& Wissen
Learning Management
Effiziente Trainings per Drag-and-Drop erstellen
Externe Trainings
Die richtigen Ressourcen immer griffbereit
Power Skills
Intensivtrainings für die wichtigsten Skills
Performance and feedback
Performance
& Feedback
Performance Reviews
Leistung fair und transparent beurteilen
360° Feedback
Feedbackkultur nach Ihren Wünschen schaffen
1:1s
Produktivere Meetings für alle ermöglichen
engagement & people analytics
Engagement
& Insights
Engagement Umfragen
Bedürfnisse verstehen und gezielt erfüllen
Meetup-Rituale
Beziehungen durch regelmäßige Meetings stärken

Plattform

|

Beratung

|

Integrationen
Referenzen
Vorlagen
JourneysFeedbackTrainingsbibliothek
Preise
HR Wissen
BlogCommunityVorlagen & PlaybooksReal-life HR Examples
Login
EN
EnglishDeutsch
LoginLogin
See it in action
Login
Settings and language
Sprache
EnglishDeutschLogin
Login
Kostenlos testenDemo vereinbaren

zavvy logo
Solutions
Preboarding and onboarding
Onboarding
& Preboarding
Preboarding
Close the gap between signing and start
Onboarding
Wow new hires without getting lost in busywork
Event Scheduling
Automatically manage your orientation events
Development & skills
Development
& Skills
Career Frameworks
Create role clarity with transparent career pathways
Growth Plans
Combine goals with measurable action
Skills Matrix
Understand everyone's strengths and opportunities
Training & Knowledge
Training
& Knowledge
Learning Management
Create and manage engaging courses
Training Library
Find the right resource for everyone
Power Skills
Find expert-led, high impact training programs
Performance and feedback
Performance
& Feedback
Performance Reviews
Measure performance without the bias and act
360° Feedback
Run any kind of feedback process
1:1s
Align people managers and reports through structure
engagement & people analytics
Engagement
& Insights
Engagement Surveys
Understand your people and engage with precision
Connection Programs
Strengthen relationships with regular meetups

Platform

|

Consultation

|

Integrations
Customers
Templates
JourneysFeedbackTraining Library
IntegrationsPricing
HR Insights
BlogCommunityTemplates & PlaybooksReal-life HR Examples
Login
EN
EnglishDeutsch
LoginLogin
See it in action
Login
Settings and language
Language
EnglishDeutschSign in
Login
Try for freeGet a demo
Navigation
Quicklinks
‍
  • 📝 What's an employee development plan?
  • ❓ Why you need to start creating development plans soon
  • 📋 Template: How to create a professional development plan
  • 🧠 Examples from other companies
  • 📈 Why (and how) to create your development plans on Zavvy
  • ➡️ Conclusion

How to Create Powerful Development Plans for Your Employees in 8 Easy Steps

Zuletzt aktualisiert:
10.5.2022
Lesezeit:
12 minutes
Last updated:
May 10, 2022
Time to read:
12 minutes
The ultimate guide to creating employee development plans. Get started easily and give your people the learning opportunities they ask for.

Your people are your biggest asset.

And how you support their professional development will largely define your whole company's success. 

The idea here is not to force employees to fulfill yet another list of seasonal tasks - but to help them unleash their potential. To enable them to perform at their best. Now and in the future.

Employee development plans are also a powerful tool to boost culture, motivation, and a sense of belonging.

While you help them become more efficient, you will reap the benefits through reduced turnover and higher employee retention rates. 

However, employee development is a gigantic field by itself - and even experienced People Ops managers struggle with wrapping their heads around a streamlined strategy.

Well, we can confidently say that development plans are the single most central step towards creating a fully-fleshed growth framework for your people.

And we'll show you how to get started.

📝 What is an employee development plan?

An employee development plan is a structured and targeted action plan for your employee's professional growth.

In essence, it defines key competencies for individual growth - along with essential measures to get there.

The end goal: To perform better in one's existing position or acquire new skills to perform in a similar or different role.

Keep in mind that there is no universal development plan, not even one designed for a specific department.

Instead, a professional development plan has to be tailored to every individual based on their role, core competencies, and goals.

❓ Benefits of employee development plans

The mere notion that someone is willing to elevate themselves can make a profound difference increase their confidence, satisfaction, trust, and long-term loyalty. 

Why employee development plans matter

Here are some more benefits of an efficient employee development plan:

‍Increased number of job applicants

Potential employees are more likely to apply to organizations that invest in their development.

In fact, 59% of millennials say opportunities to learn and grow are "extremely important" when applying for a job.‍

Lower turnover

the development programs will make your employees feel more valued, thus motivating them to continue working at your organization:

A whopping 94% of employees will stay longer at a company if it invests in their development.

Better employee succession

Data-driven employee development is the perfect baseline for smart career progression models.

You'll be able to identify who's a fit for a promotion and help them along the way. You'll also give your people a perspective and develop them in a specific direction with precision.

Higher employee engagement

Your employees will be more engaged in their role, knowing you're willing to invest in their future.

More profits

Perhaps the most critical factor for some companies - employees with improved skills will be more productive, find new solutions, and increase company revenue.

This one's pretty straightforward, right?

But there's more: 70% of employees say they don't master the skills required to do their jobs, in the first place. In that light, a development plan is rather about catching up than advancing.

Better foresight

Employee development plans guide you to look at your company's future so you're better equipped for new staffing-related challenges. 

With these factors in mind, let's go through some practical steps to create and maintain your company's development plans.

📋 Template: How to create a professional development plan

Creating a decent professional development plan is not at all complex. All it takes is going through a series of structured steps. While every plan will differ based on your industry, company, role, and specific employee, here are some universal steps you can begin with.

1. Company perspective

Identify company needs

This is a crucial step for your company's future and the foundation for everything that comes next.

It means looking into your company's plans for the upcoming months and years and seeing what needs to be done and how.

This is your chance - and responsibility - to give HR a strategic say at the table.

Give yourself some time for this step and ask questions like:

  • Do we attract the right kind of talent?
  • Am I happy with the way our employees are growing within my company?
  • Will the current pace of growth be good enough for the months and years to come?
  • Are my employees happy with the growth opportunities they have within our organization?
  • How good is our retention, and are my colleagues leaving for better options?
  • Are we keeping up with the latest changes in technology and industry trends?
  • And most importantly: What strategic direction is the company moving into - and what skills does it need for that?

Once you have an honest answer to all of these questions, you'll have a great starting point, not just for one employee's career development plan but for an entire department in your organization.

Do listen to your gut feeling and include:

  • Your top management team.
  • Department team leads.
  • Everyone else who may have a good idea of what it takes to get your company to that next level.

Skill gap analysis

To complement these results, skills matrices can give you powerful insights into the competencies currently present in the org.

skills matrix spreadsheet template download

Start with talking to your employees or orchestrating training needs analysis to determine what kind of skill gap you have at your hand.

You can also get in touch with their people's immediate managers to discover areas of improvement.
For example, if you aim to close 30% more deals by this time next year, you should invest in upskilling your sales team as part of your employee development plans.

Example for an employee skill (gap) matrix. It helps you identify opportunities for growth on a team or company level.

2. Put your people in the driver's seat of their own growth

We recommend putting your people into the driver's seat of their development. 

If they're not on board with the program, they will not stick with the proposed activities, and you'll be wasting both time and money.

Make them understand the overall organizational goals - but have their own aspirations determine at least 50% of the development program's focus.

To do so, we recommend creating 2-4 focus areas:

Competencies or skills that an employee wants to improve during the development cycle.

Have them create a draft by themselves - and discuss it together. Depending on the workings of your company, this is either the role of HR/L&D or the learner's people manager. Ideally, even both.

To help your colleagues find valuable focus areas, ask them a series of questions regarding their personal needs and goals within the company. 

These can include:

  • Where am I now? What is my role?
  • What is expected from me in this role?
  • What would make me better in my role? 
  • What is holding me back from meeting my expectations?
  • When I picture myself 6 months from now, what skills do I have that I don't have now? 
  • What do I need to do to get to that version of myself? 

This first conversation will be the cornerstone of your employee development plan and help you guide everyone's efforts in the right direction.

This way, you will be enriching your employees’ journey at your company during moments that matter. Developing their skill sets gives them a chance of promotion or making a lateral move in your organization. As an employer, you will get the satisfaction of your employees, crushing your organizational goals while boosting your profits.

In your communication with the employee, you should be open, welcome their feedback, and signal that development is a priority - even during busy seasons. (And we all know: things are always busy)
But, at the same time, you should stress that the program's success largely depends on their commitment and dedication.

3. Find a place to document your career development plans

To make your life easier, we went ahead and creates templates for you:

Option 1: 🧾  Excel-Template

Development Plan excel Preview
Download: 🧾 Employee development plan template [Spreadsheet]

Option 2: 📄 PDF-Template

employee development plan template PDF
Download: 📄 Employee Development Plan Template [PDF]

Option 3: ⚙️ Automated solution

Automated employee development plan software
➡️ And if you're looking for a more streamlined experience, you can run the whole process via our employee development software:

4. Make sure the goals are realistic

Ambitious goals are great.

But if they're too ambitious, they will end up causing frustration.

Plus, a goal only makes sense as long as it's trackable.

If you set goals that are unmeasurable and unrealistic, you will have a hard time tracking whether the development program is working or not. For example, “improving my communication skills is a great goal to aspire to, but it’s hardly measurable. For soft skills, you’ll need to develop a different method to assess and measure them, so take your time here to create something meaningful.

The key here is having clear, well-defined goals.

We recommend following the SMART principles as drafted below:

Setting smart goals is more motivating and effective

5. Identify actual activities - together

Great news - now that you know who's on board and what skills they need to fulfill their plans, people can define various activities for each focus area. 

Who should do this?

Everybody is different. And people prefer different means of learning. Plus, asking HR to define these activities is highly inefficient as they can't possibly know every role's training opportunities in detail.

Hence: 

  • Employees should create a draft themselves
  • People managers should give feedback
  • and HR can consult.

Here are some examples a decent development plan can benefit from: 

  • Courses: a more formal teaching method that doesn't require direct involvement from your company
  • Mentoring: one-on-one mentoring is one of the easiest ways to transfer knowledge directly within your company and can help both the mentor and the mentee
  • Job rotation: if you prepare your employees to make a lateral move, allow them to take a set of entirely different responsibilities 
  • Job succession planning: make a detailed outline of an employee's career path, should they stay in your company for a prolonged time.
  • Coaching: hire an external coach or have someone within your team who can help your employee(s) learn new skills 
  • Online resources: quizzes, ebooks, guides, courses, podcasts, communities, and much more

Once you start doing some basic research, you'll see how many opportunities there are to upskill your employees, provided you've set a strong foundation for your employee development program.

One tip that can greatly help is to have a set of activities planned in advance.

For example, finding the right mentor for your employee will help them become better at closing sales calls. 

You can offer your employees options during the very first meeting, and they can decide who they're more comfortable working with.

This way, you can hit the ground running and get started with your employee development plan immediately.

If you're open to inspiration, we've gathered 6 innovative employee development activities you can start with.

Pro tip: Encourage people to follow the 70:20:10 principle or similar splits to avoid limiting plans to mere theory.

6. Support your people to actually go through

The thing about any plan is: It's only worth as much as the action that follows.

For instance, not even 10% of the video courses get finished.

It's absolutely vital to offer support and motivate your employees during the process. Send them reminders, ask them questions, or help them create a structure to create a balance between their workflow and the training process. 

The same goes for people managers: Give them guidance and a structure to use in their development talks. Remind them. Keep them going.

Zavvy's manager companion automatically reminds managers to talk to their employees, e.g. about their development plan
Zavvy's manager companion automatically reminds managers to talk to their employees, e.g. about their development plan

In addition, this comes down to the bigger picture. Does your company have a culture of learning? A growth mindset is the ultimate driver of continuous learning - and consequently development plan completions.

7. Track the results

Now that you've put everything into place, it's time to track the success of your career development plan. To do that, you need to approach it from two different angles - the employee's level and the company's level.

From the employee's side, you'll want to ensure that the activities in the employee development plan are elevating their skills and making a tangible improvement over time.
Many times, it's not possible to objectively measure the progress of some skills (example: soft skills). For this, you will have to resort to interviews with your employees. Also, it's a good idea to ask their direct managers if they see any improvements moving in the right direction.
On the company's side, it gets a little bit more complex. To measure the results of your plan, in the long run, you need to keep up with how your employees are progressing at an individual level.
That can be quite a challenge, so we are here to help you simplify it by keeping track of your employee development activities.
You can use our customizable templates to schedule meetings to run pulse surveys to get more timely results. That way, you can make changes more quickly if things don't seem to be going in the right direction.

🔄 At Zavvy, we help companies implement continuous feedback from different perspectives to close the circle.

8. Don't shy away from iterating

Don't be afraid to revisit your employee development plan. Doing this will help you:

  • Get input.
  • Fine-tune individual components.
  • Conduct a formal assessment.
  • Help you understand how the career development plan affects processes.

Keep orchestrating assessments and re-tuning them. This will ensure your plans are effective and just what your employees need. 

development plan spreadsheet template download

🧠 Examples from other companies's career development plans

The only thing constant is change. And the best way to create or improvise your employee development plan is by taking inspiration from companies that have nailed them. 

➡️ If you want to dive deeper, we've gathered and critiqued 6 different development plan examples to help you refine yours.

Career development action plan for exmployees at SEOptimer.

They put the weight of the employee development plan mainly on the employee. First, the employee has to do a self-assessment of their most essential motivators, skills, and competencies and how they see their future roll out in the company.

Moreover, they need to set short-, medium- and long-term goals. This is a good starting point, but the form won’t be enough to produce good results. You also need to add another layer of information through an interview with the employee. 

Here is another example of a fairly simple employee development plan from SEOptimer:

Example of a personal development plan (PDP) at SEOptimer. It's more ebalorate than the first example

As you can see, this one allows more room for employees and employers to express their perspectives. 

The only downfall: It’s quite unlikely that an employee will instinctively know what skills gap you have in the company and what specific activities they can do to get to their desired skill set.

They won’t know the ideal evaluation period either.

Here is another version of a similar employee development plan from SEOptimer:

Example for an employee development plan at SEOptimer. It's a 12-month outlook.

This one is slightly more detailed because it covers a specific career goal and lists particular skills gaps that need to be addressed and actions that can be performed within a timeframe.

When it comes to lessons you can learn from these plans and examples, one that matters is that the length of each development plan is at least 3 months. 

Another learning is that you’ll have a host of documents regarding their skills and individual plans for each employee. If you have many employees, this documentation quickly piles up and requires lots of organization.

Of course, you could do this manually. But your time is precious.

Our tools allow you to manage your entire development framework on autopilot, making it easy to set and track employee development initiatives.

The two angles of employee development

All of these examples have in common that they all look at development plans from an employee's perspective. While this is beneficial, it does miss out. 

To design a harmonious employee development plan, you need to consider the needs of both - the employees' path to acquire new skills and the employer's journey to success.

However, we recommend at least a 50:50 mix between individual goals and the company perspective - with a tendency towards an employee's side.

Only promise what you can

Development plans are a great way to make colleagues feel valued, supported, and invested in.

But: Be careful about making false promises.

An overall career progression framework can take your L&D-strategy to a whole new level.

But: Be considerate and transparent about the impact people can expect.

Ask yourself: What exactly do people get out of fulfilling their plans? Is a raise feasible? Or is it merely for their own growth?

Just be sure you are aware of these benefits and call them out. And don't call anything out which you won't be able to deliver on.

➡️ Learn more about career progression models here.

📈 Why (and how) to create your employee development plans on Zavvy

Once you're running employee development for more than a bunch of people, things will quickly get messy:

  • Employee development plans are scattered all over the place - no matter if done in Excel, PDFs, or Powerpoint
  • No way to track progress centrally
  • No orientation without centrally communicated competency models for each role
  • Things get lost in daily work

With Zavvy, you can run your whole employee development framework in one central place - and on autopilot.

Awaken your static spreadsheets to life by

  • 📅 Setting up your company's development cycle once - and running it on autopilot
  • 💬 Engaging everyone involved with guidance and motivating messages
  • ❗️ Making them meaningful by connecting development plans to career frameworks and feedback
Employee development plan software
➡️ Learn how to run a cycle of continuous development - with Zavvy‍

➡️ Conclusion

For many companies, employee development plans are something they take for granted for too long. By the time they realise they need to help their employees, they already feel the negative effects of low employee satisfaction and high turnover.

Introducing an effective development plan benefits everyone - it makes your employees happier and it helps your company grow in the long run. If you’re on the fence, don’t be - start working on your employee development plans immediately! We’re here to help you every step of the way — from identifying room for improvement to tracking results, setting goals and achieving them with ease.

development plan spreadsheet template download
Employee onboarding software bannerLearning management system EN360 Grad Feedback BannerEnablement ENEnablement ENPeople development software
Mitarbeiter Onboarding Software Zavvy Bannerlearning management system 
Mitarbeiter Enablement Software
Enablement ENTalent Management Software
Keke Kaikhosroshvili
Keke Kaikhosroshvili

Keke is Zavvy's expert in learning experience. On our blog, she shares experience and insights based on her studies in learning design and experiences made with our customers.

Linkedin LogoMedium Logo

Read next

Als Nächstes lesen

How Avi Medical trains their staff in the flow of work with scenario-based, blended, and micro learning
Creating a training routine for leaders at Freeletics
How Y-Combinator-Backed Awesomic Gets Their Top-Notch Designers Up To Speed
How DataGuard Runs Hybrid Onboarding and Internal Communication via Zavvy

Eine neue Trainingsroutine für die Führungskräfte bei Freeletics

Onboarding bei Storyblok - So schafft das People Team großartige Erfahrungen, während das Unternehmen von 33 auf 139 Mitarbeitende wächst.

Storyblok spart jede Woche 15 Stunden und hebt Remote-Onboarding auf die nächste Stufe.

Wie neue Mitarbeitende bei Alasco schneller und effektiver eingebunden werden. Case Study lesen.

Wie Alasco die Zeit bis zur Produktivität mit einem strukturierten, unterhaltsamen Onboarding halbiert hat.

A Complete Guide to 360 Evaluation Tools: Finding the Best One for You
11 minutes
Employee Peer Review: How to Boost Morale and Productivity With This Ultimate Guide
16 minutes
7 Best Practices for Your Company’s Performance Review Calibration
10 minutes
Nie wieder schlechte Mitarbeiterleistung: Lernen Sie, wie man sie effektiv diagnostiziert und angeht
9 Minuten
Anonymes Mitarbeiter-Feedback: 5 Argumente dafür und 5 dagegen (mit Unternehmensbeispielen)
12 Minuten
Best Practices zur (360-Grad)-Leistungsbewertung - So holen Sie mehr raus
12 Minuten
How to Conduct a Skills Gap Analysis: Steps, Best Practices, and a Template
13 minutes
6 Expert Ways to Integrate Performance Management and Talent Management
13 minutes
19 Incredible Benefits of Coaching in the Workplace
10 minutes
Anforderungsprofile: Mit der richtigen Rollenbeschreibung zu mehr Rollenklarheit und cleverer Personalentwicklung
14 Minuten
Leistungsziele vs. Entwicklungsziele: Unterschiede und wie man sie richtig nutzt
12 Minuten
Training vs. Entwicklung: Die zwei Seiten des nachhaltigen Mitarbeiterwachstums
7 Minuten
Top Leadership Books and Resources Recommended by Acting CEOs and Founders
11 minutes
How Do You Communicate Employee Engagement Report Results Effectively? (With Examples)
10 minutes
10 HR People Strategy Examples from Leading Corporate Employers
15 minutes
6 Best Practices zur HR-Automatisierung für moderne People Ops
8 Minuten
Wie Sie Ihre nächste Präsentation zur Personalstrategie meistern: Ein Leitfaden für HR-Führungskräfte (+ Vorlage)
9 Minuten
Vertrauen am Arbeitsplatz schaffen: 17 Wege, wie Sie heute beginnen können
12 Minuten
12 Top-HR-Tools für Kleinunternehmen
7 Minuten
47 Wege zur Steigerung des Engagements im Homeoffice (mit Beispielen und Tipps)
13 Minuten
Welches innovative Arbeitszeitmodell passt zu mir?
5 Minuten
15 Hybrid and Remote Work Trends You Cannot Afford to Ignore
12 minutes
How to Be a Great Remote Leader: Overcome Challenges and Inspire Your Team
11 minutes
33 Hybrid And Remote Work Statistics That Explain The Future Of Work
10 minutes
Company
AboutImprintContactPrivacyGDPR & SecurityJobsUser loginLinkedIn icon
Linkedin
Product
OnboardingPreboardingDevelopmentCareer PathwaysFeedbackTrainingPerformanceOnboarding WorkflowsSkills MatrixAnonymous Feedback
Resources
Case StudiesBlogDownloads11 Onboarding TemplatesLeadership Competency ModelCompetency Matrix TemplatePress
The latest insights & best practices on L&D and employee experience - delivered right to your inbox.
One more step - We have sent you an email!
Please confirm your address by clicking the link in there.
Oops! Something went wrong while submitting the form.
Sign up for our newsletter
Unternehmen
ImpressumKontaktPrivatssphäre
Ressourcen
Case StudiesBlog
Folgen Sie uns
LinkedIn icon
Linkedin
Erhalten Sie die neuesten Insights und Best Practices zu Personalentwicklung direkt in Ihr Postfach.
One more step - We have sent you an email!
Please confirm your address by clicking the link in there.
Oops! Something went wrong while submitting the form.
Zum Newsletter anmelden