Canadian HR Reporter

CanaDian hr reporTer november 3, 2014 14 news Faculty of Education Centre for Adult Education and Community Outreach to help enhance your skills too." Employers can help mitigate feelings of boredom and pre-empt the urge to leave the organization in pursuit of a promotion, said Mary Haskins, regional vice-pres- ident and practice leader at Right Management in Denver. "Some organizations have put in place actual programs where they've identifi ed the high-poten- tials and they've put them through a program that gives them expo- sure to the various parts of the business — so that helps keep them engaged, but they're also learning new parts of the busi- ness," she said. "Another thing that can be done is put in place, either formally or informally, mentoring with a senior-level person within the organization so they can gain not only exposure to those senior-level individuals, but also their insights." Motivating high-potentials to stay isn't about just one factor, said McLellan — it's about getting the whole package right. "Career advancement always tops the chart… but the other drivers continue to be base pay and, surprisingly, job security. We might have in our mind that high-potentials are not concerned about job security, but it is some- thing that's on people's minds," she said, adding that leadership and direct managers can also be key retention drivers. Promotions not the only option Developing a high-potential is no longer just a question of when he's up for his next promotion, said Haskins, since many careers no longer follow the traditional "climbing the ladder" trajectory. "Nowadays, it isn't necessarily moving straight up — it tends to be more of a lattice type of ap- proach, where sometimes those advancements could be in a dif- ferent department or part of the business. It's not necessarily a ver- tical move, but more of a lateral move, where they're gaining that additional experience," she said. "So setting those expectations as to not only how quickly they'll ad- vance, but how they'll advance is also important." Today, we have four diff erent generations in the workforce si- multaneously, said LaMere, so senior positions aren't opening up as quickly as expected. "Those vacancies that we thought were going to be there before we went into the reces- sion, they're not there quite yet," she said. "Sometimes, a high- potential could be frustrated (by that)… If there's not something that's immediately in their career path, it's talking to them about other things that are outside their main trajectory. "What are other lateral moves that you could make in the orga- nization that really expand the toolbox of your skills?" at's where the manager's role comes into play because it will be up to them to be fl exible and to determine how high-potentials can broaden and customize their experience, said McLellan. And, in all of this, communica- tion is key, said Haskins. "It's critical that with high-po- tentials that they're identifi ed, and that their managers are actually having conversations with them to say, 'Look, you've been identi- fi ed as a high-potential and here's a developmental plan,'" she said. "It's really critical in several areas that there's that communi- cation that occurs — it's not just something where the manager thinks they're high-potential, but they actually have the conversa- tion with the employee, and the employee is recognized or called out that they are a high-potential." reTenTIon < pg. 3 More than just promotions Many careers no longer follow the "climbing the ladder" trajectory. Large gains in tech salary surVeys < pg. 2 per cent, and IT services, at 3.25 per cent come next, while the in- dustries seeing the lowest predic- tions include not-for-profi t, at 2.98 per cent, retail, at 2.73 per cent, and the public sector, at one per cent. Professional occupations The largest expected gains in starting salaries among profes- sional occupations are in tech- nology, according to a survey by Robert Half. Overall, base com- pensation for IT professionals in Canada is expected to increase 5.2 per cent in the coming year. at's a slight dip from the fore- cast of 5.5 per cent last year, said Dianne Hunnam-Jones, district president for Robert Half Canada in Toronto. Mobile, security and big data will be three drivers of technology hiring in 2015 and mobile applications develop- ers can expect the biggest gains among all tech roles. "Every company's worried about their Internet and their IT security and big data is becoming a huge, huge focus in many com- panies — how do they harness the information they've gathered over the years, make sense of it for their business strategy? So that is defi - nitely driving demand for hiring in the technology arena," she said. Overall, starting salaries for professional occupations are pro- jected to go up an average of 3.7 per cent next year, found Robert Half, whose results are based on the company's placements and contracts, along with surveys of hiring managers. "Based on what's going on from a macro-economic standpoint, we know our unemployment rate sits in Canada around seven per cent but in all of these professional occupational sectors, the unem- ployment rate sits much lower — sometimes it's half of what the na- tional average is, so just the pure supply of these people in the pro- fessional occupations is pushing up, because it's so low, the supply, and the demand is outstripping (supply)," said Hunnam-Jones. Creative and marketing, and accounting and fi nance profes- sionals can expect starting salaries to rise an average of 3.9 and 3.4 per cent respectively, according to the survey. " e regulatory environment just continues to drive hiring in the risk compliance and audit ar- eas," she said. In the legal fi eld, starting sala- ries are anticipated to rise 2.6 per cent, with mid- and senior-level lawyers popular in high-growth areas such as litigation, general business, commercial law and in- tellectual property. Starting salaries for administra- tive professionals should see gains of 3.3 per cent, with a continued need for support staff in health care, HR and customer service.

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