Novations: Strategies for Career Management

I have read this book several times over the last 20 years. I, along with colleagues, have used the concepts of the Stages of Contribution or Career Stages as the infrastructure for designing strategic human resource systems including components in the Assessment, Selection, and Development areas of these systems. It is also an excellent schematic for training and development activities, and specifically with coaching, for people that are making the transition from one stage to another. I was first introduced to the concepts in organizational behavior classes by the authors in 1976 when their research was fresh. I consider this body of work to be one of the most overlooked stashes of intellectual capital available for designing the webs of intangible assets that are critical to the strategic and tactical success of modern organizations. The only criticism I make of their work is that they framed it as a careers model. It certainly is that. However, the greatest power in the model is in the designing of the human capital infrastructure of the organization.

The authors found that people's careers can be characterized by four stages: apprentice, individual contributor, mentor, and sponsor. If people do one stage well, they find it much easier to progress to the next stage. At each stage, the person must do certain things well for other people to consider them successful. If you know what other people expect, you're better able to succeed.Years ago when I worked with summer students, I gave them the first assignment to read about the first three stages. Then we talked about what each of us should expect from the other. Later when I became a team lead, I had forgotten about this book, and didn't do it. I found some of my earlier notes, and realized that I had had several problems with some team members that I probably would have not had if I had given them that assignment.