Paul Sandry HR Global HR Director for InMobil’s Revenue and Operations functions explores Internal Mobiity and Employee Development. Article from Ashley Kate HR

Responsible for InMobi’s Revenue and Operations functions across North America, Europe, Asia Pacific and in India Paul has worked in senior HR and talent management roles for over 15 years. As part of the human resources leadership team. Paul is responsible for developing and deploying the people strategy for the business

Internal Mobility and Employee Development are two key focus areas Paul’s team are actively engaged in. Paul commented ‘There are a number of initiatives we are deploying to strengthen our line management capabilities including building self-awareness in our managers as well as mentoring capabilities. However, even more interesting is what we are trying to do to create opportunity and challenge for everyone in the business, not just high performers’.

The team have a programme called “Bridge Assignments” whereby any employee can request to work in any other department or aspect of the company on a part-time project basis to give people a chance to taste and explore other roles and stimulate career interest. ‘Our employee population skews to the younger side and most millennials seek experience, want to explore passions and embark on careers that pique their curiosity.’ Said Paul.

A second initiative rolled out was “Live your Potential” this allows all employees to apply internally to any open position after working in a role for at least 6 months and to register their interest for a role change. The idea behind this is to work with employees individually to understand their strengths and desired career trajectory and align next roles, development initiatives and individual training budgets to meet their career aspirations and goals. ‘Early indications are very promising and employees from many disciplines have moved horizontally and vertically within the organisation while others have been able to chart an entirely new path and career without having to leave the company’

When asked ‘what the challenges were?’ Paul responded ‘For any internal mobility program to work, you have to start by looking at your hiring model. It took us some time but we have successfully shifted from valuing only the experience on a candidate’s CV to focusing on their potential and attitude.

He further stated ‘One challenge is changing the mindset of managers who spend the time to hire and on-board someone. It takes some time to ramp up a new employee’s productivity and to understand the company culture and how to be successful. Once productive, many managers will be hesitant to want to give up their high performing employees to a role change. The fundamental truth though is people will leave an organisation anyway if they don’t see the next step or feel challenged so we try and create that next step within the organisation. It’s a challenge to get managers to see this philosophy can create long-term value for employees and the organization overall and to resist thinking short-term’.

To overcome these challenges we built a core philosophy called “Springboard” which facilitates and captures all the necessary development feedback and career planning conversations along with the written documentation. These documents provide a record that can be passed from one manager to the next.

A second challenge faced was to make sure there was a clean handover from one manager to the next with gaps, strengths and aspirations mapped out so the new manager can carry forward the employee’s career trajectory.

To overcome these, steps have been taken with managers to explain the benefits of these programmes. Most managers were aware that even if they were to lose a high performer to another team internally, they too one day will also be a recipient of a good performer from another team- almost a “pay it forward” idea said Paul, who also added “Of course managing expectations of employees who request a role change is key. The right next role may not be there today. To solve for this, our HR and talent champions are actively engaged with every case on a weekly basis to ensure communications are crisp and expectations are adequately set.”

The future plans for this initiative are to rollout and augment internal mobility and development programmes with additional toolsets and frameworks designed to help managers and employees plot their career trajectory as well as making developmental needs more actionable. We are also looking at creative ways like using video and other methods to highlight non-traditional paths to employees are also being looked into .

The benefits of creating more career movement within an organisation are potentially tremendous from an engagement and retention perspective. Most employees feel it’s fairer to give internal applicants a first chance at open roles and appreciate the opportunity to explore new things internally. “I see many young people joining with a good degree and some working experience but many are not yet fixed on a particular career path so organizations need to be more flexible in their hiring models and career path planning” Paul advised.