21: Personalized development paths

Kasia Szczesna (00:01.056)
The time to think about the fact that studies will guarantee us work, I think is long behind us. I think that the time of thinking that taking a course once a year and releasing an employee for training that is only within the budget and is not adequate to his needs as well as the company, is also behind us. I think there is a big enough market shift at this point that we all know and feel about.

that the education and development of competences should take place every day and more and more often than do it as blind shots. That's why we decided to meet here to talk about what the current market looks like, what's happening now. Here, too, I will refer to several reports to understand the facts.

also referring to their own experiences with Design Mentorship, from their own supports from behavioral economics, but also to show what is important for us to take into account in the process of acquiring new competencies. Moreover, it will also show what solutions can be for this, which we have also started to apply in our organization. But starting with...

a fact that is currently referring to the reports and I think I will start theoretically and starting with the big fish like the World Economic Forum, which the organization that surveyed, did a study in which 800 companies participated, a total of about 11 million workers from 45 countries, analyzed the expectations of employees.

The results show that by 2027, 6 out of 10 workers will need to train in order to upgrade their qualifications or acquire totally new ones. This already shows in research how employees will have to acquire new competencies and the question of whether going to 5 years of studies, one year studies or one day training is actually the solution to this.

Kasia Szczesna (02:15.648)
It also fits in with what's going on. Moreover, I think it is worth referring to the psychological state in Poland, where here the In Future Institute study, where 53% of Poles experience loneliness, and in the group of 24 years and younger, every third consider loneliness to be one of the three main factors underlying their well-being. Right, the question is, is this remote education?

Education for acquiring competencies through online courses, where we are often alone, actually drives this level of loneliness and stress, which I will also mention here in the context of acquiring competencies and how this loneliness and this stress affects us. Moreover, based on Randstadt's research from Work Monitor 2024,

Despite different approaches to career advancement, 72% of employees value learning new skills. About 1.3% of employees would consider leaving a job that does not offer adequate learning and development opportunities. This underscores the growing importance as employees translate to opportunities for growth in workplaces. Moreover, Work Monitor...

Here he strongly paid attention to the well-being of the state, to the work-life balance that employees increasingly value, to hybrid work, or not only to development by receiving a new position. It is not the most important thing at this moment to stay on the career ladder, but a strong commitment also to other projects that will simply give us...

satisfaction and will also motivate us to continue working. Moreover, referring also to the Work Monitor, according to the study, we are slightly less optimistic than workers in other countries about the possibility of communicating their professional ambitions. Globally 46% of respondents

Kasia Szczesna (04:26.752)
He is of the opinion that he can talk openly with the employer about career development opportunities. In Poland, this is confirmed slightly less, with 42% of employees. Let's see that this is over, over, lower than half of the people who can talk openly with their employer about development. If we want to grow our business and want to introduce innovative things, use the knowledge of employees,

Well, if an employee does not know his clear career path and how he can develop he is only doing his job, which is often very much in the factory perspective, then how to strengthen the commitment and motivation of this employee here. Moreover, I refer to further large players. Workplace Learning Report by LinkedIn.

The platform highlighted that the skills of its members have changed by about 25% in the last six years. Moreover, the same members foresee a change of 40% by 2025. Another thing that also shows us that more and more people, a large percentage of people are thinking about raising their qualifications. Moreover, in the roll of The World Economic Forum,

experts from the World Economic Forum suggest that the use of skills, competencies, talent in an organization can be a key differentiator between companies that prosper and those that fail. Therefore, it is worth noting where our employees are and, perhaps, their career path needs to be changed. So the markets notice it, the big companies notice it.

who are increasingly having an increasing problem with finding people, not only those who have knowledge, because here I will refer to the podcast technologically, in which Bartek Pucek and Jarosław Kuźniar talk, who stressed that it is not difficult to find a person who has knowledge, but it is difficult to find a person who delivers, who also combines facts. Therefore, another factor that creeps in strongly here is the predisposition we have, because already...

Kasia Szczesna (06:47.424)
having knowledge will not be such a value proposition as it was until now, because when we went to certain courses, trainings, studies, we usually went for knowledge. And at that moment, when we have it at our fingertips and we have it updated and we can use it, which of course has its pros and cons in the perspective of the learning process, but also the question of whether we should go only to acquire knowledge or to combine facts.

work on a clear problem and it was also nicely interpreted by Bartek Pucek, who I emphasize, I recommend the podcast technologically. You can do online courses all year round, cool, but if you have not built anything, you have not done anything in this regard, okay, then this knowledge is only in your head, it is completely unused and nobody knows that you have this knowledge, you have that you can build something interesting.

So we go to the stage where we think about how to learn, what is important for us in our daily life and taking into account this very important context in my world, to understand where we are now and what we have, not only to learn by heart, to check and not to arouse any emotions at the same time, but how...

strengthen this memory trace so that this knowledge is used as much as possible for us as individuals, for example, whether entrepreneurs or people who are employed in certain companies, so that companies can also use it so that we shoot business in this good way. Moreover, maybe starting with the psychological part that I mentioned, the well-being of Poles, but also in the world,

It's pretty low level. We are afraid, of course these changes fuel a certain fear, fear of change, which is natural, that we like things that we simply know and naturally we will strive for what is pleasant for us, because yet we are faced with some change, uncertainty and the question of whether we keep up with it. Therefore, this stress does not have a good effect on our memory footprint at all.

Kasia Szczesna (09:13.248)
negative emotions are recorded in us, which do not necessarily have a good effect on the acquisition of new competencies. Therefore, it is loneliness that we often say, ok, well, we will take an online course, is it really the best solution for us to translate this knowledge into action as soon as possible in the context in which we are and with these opportunities that the work environment gives us, for example. Not always.

and talking here and watching our mentoring, not always this nicely glazed knowledge, processes and superbly arranged in such a training context and with respect to the project, for us to go step by step, is adequate to what situation we have at work. Often conflicts and problem situations in projects, this is communication, these are people, we meet...

with different cultures, with different attitudes and you also have to talk about it openly, we do not always find common flow with employees, with people in the team, therefore these are things that we will not learn at the training, we will not learn in the workshop, where unfortunately there are 20 other people sitting with us, where we will talk about the situation that actually occurred in the company.

and how can we talk about a problem that actually also arises from communication. Therefore, it is worth thinking about where we have such a safe space for development, so that we can take an insightful look at the problem that affects us. Returning to organizations and what happens in companies, these are usually training programs. So as you can see, we are already a little anchored in what our development looks like. We can go to the...

Training. And usually the employer gives us a certain budget, that is, that is, which is totally ok. We have X money at our disposal. The only question is, if the data, the training given does not fit into this budget and if we could add to that or take advantage of some other opportunities through the company to show the value, why this element is important to us.

Kasia Szczesna (11:32.8)
whether it is for example mentoring support or coaching support and show what value can be translated to the organization, or is it not worth thinking about it as development paths, about where it is given to employees. We, like all of us, like to know where we are going, how clear the path of our career is and as I referred to these studies, often less than 50%, probably 42% of people in Poland...

there is no opportunity to talk to the employer about your career path. And if we do not know where we are going, then our commitment and our motivation will not be at a high level. And I believe that each of us is capable of learning everything, but it is also a question of motivation. What engages us, what motivates us. But if we have blockers in a company that kind of limits us and doesn't show us in which direction to go,

Of course, I understand on the side of the organization, on the employee side, that it should be one path. We should justify what is important to us, what values are for the organization, so that we can outline where it is going and what it will bring as value to the company. I will return to these trainings, because maybe this is also a question for you. Is the training you are attending usually on your calendar? I often come across the fact that many people are sitting.

at the post office, receiving calls, there is no time to complete this training in full. So if our attention is elsewhere and realizes that in online training we have x open browsers or bookmarks, then we are not at all fully focused on this training. So that's what I'm going to address as well, is it worth doing such things. I think it's worth emphasizing here that we respect our time.

our energy, our commitment to which we actually put effort, because it is supposed to pay off. Then we get the worst, I think, the option also from a psychological perspective is that when we sit down to something and we have somewhere in our head that we heard something, but we don't even know how to use it. I think that's the biggest educational failure when we learn and we can't use that knowledge. Therefore, let's consider...

Kasia Szczesna (13:56.768)
how to actually approach competency acquisition effectively when we have so many opportunities. I would also like to mention here that this technological change that is happening and the big headlines that scream at us that AI will take our jobs, we can use these tools and these opportunities to build precisely our own career paths, where we have such opportunities, when certificates and diplomas are less and less important, of course depending on the industry.

but we look less and less at it, we look at competencies, at personality, at predisposition, at combining facts, yes, what we have done so far and I often wonder why this problem arises, that we are not able to connect this knowledge and acquiring this knowledge with today's present day. Moreover, informing and collecting passive information, cool quotes from this...

As it looks in theory, it may not change our behavior at all. And here I will strongly argue, for example, whether it is social proof or the principles of authority that we learn best from others. And this is if we see for example our mentor or coach who shows us how important it is to him.

what case did he encounter with his experience, what he struggled with, which is also very crucial, because we often see a person, our expert mentor or expert mentor, and we think that she does not have these problems that we encounter, and it turns out that we often solve similar problems. When we see that a person depends a lot on how they handled the situation, how they perceived the situation, how they put it together...

certain memory traces and the knowledge she acquired, it is crucial for us to motivate ourselves even more if we have access to a person who has gone through this path. I will emphasize that mentoring is not always found, we can find a mentor who is on the full path that belongs to us. The market is changing. At this point, not always the person will have all the competencies that we would like to acquire, but at a certain stage of development.

Kasia Szczesna (16:15.104)
of this transition from A to B, what I think is most important at this point is that we know what behaviors to adopt, what steps than just passively listening, passively repeating and sometimes passively talking in all this, without seeing behind this talking, talking about deeds. Moreover, learning by doing.

I think that here is already this text heavily wiped out in the market, so that we learn by doing. Just what is the action if at a given stage, in a given training workshop we are based on some case 'ie question whether the person who is in this workshop is able to transfer a given situation to himself, to the company. I think that from experience I think not always.

There is also this aspect of the limit that we have. Whether it is the limit and barriers with communication, organizational barriers. Sometimes the organization is not ready for what we would like to propose and here we have to connect many dots or people from the organization to talk to them, how to make a given change or how to remedy something. I believe that not always this workshop with such an exemplary problem...

is practical. We can approach it differently when we are working on a current, real problem that we are just encountering in our work environment. We take into account that we must have, as I said before, a safe space that we can analyze, understand, but also share. As for mentoring, of course here if there is a need...

signing documents when it comes to confidentiality, that is, the so-called NDA. If someone wants to feel safe, if the company requires it, I think it's some element, the foundation for us to be able to develop nicely on what is happening right now for a given employee or for a given team. What's more...

Kasia Szczesna (18:34.784)
If there is someone, if we see the person as they are, we will cut it out and mark it. Another thing that I personally miss at this point in the market and in our approach to employee development is that sometimes this training lasts a day, the training lasts two days and we fly with the material.

Personally, I think this knowledge is no longer a secret. Breaking things down into small steps is crucial so that we, our memory is better, but also a greater understanding of the material we have processed. Therefore, the question of whether what the training market offers us is adequate for this learning to have its best application. How could we use it?

So, the exemplary feedback, yes, that is, the feedback we get after the completed task also strengthens our memory trace, our emotions, the fact that we can analyze thoroughly what has been done and not hide, we rarely have time for such constructive, in-depth feedback of what we have done. I'll go back to the stress level.

which and the remarks that I think are precisely what is needed here, where when we are in a new environment and we do not know if we can ask something, if we do not know if we can develop something in a given topic, it is also a certain level of stress, we do not have information whether our employer will be happy with it or not. That's why I'll be back.

to the memory trace, to stress, to the fact that in a stressful and distracted environment, where we have many things on the wallpaper, this knowledge will not always be assimilated well. So a question to ponder if what we're doing isn't just a cool marketing ploy for us to pass...

Kasia Szczesna (20:53.278)
given training program, whether we are able to answer it with something else. And going one step further, looking at how they understand the problems of the company, how we can influence our learning, what we could do and what we also began to analyze in Design Mentorship and also work with companies, this is the three-step element that we started to develop.

The first element, which is very important for us from the perspective of the company, but also of the employees, because we look from two perspectives. Not only how a company is supposed to evaluate and grow, although we know well that the development of a company is the employees who do a given job, develop a given product, a given service, how they implement their ideas, how the association works, how we can connect certain points of contact.

and create a certain solution, because we begin to understand what problem we are facing, for example whether our users, customers. From the first stages in Design Mentor Shift we have such three stages. The first stage is understanding. Understanding where a company is, understanding how it has done with development programs or training programs, what has gone well, what has gone wrong.

what he can afford, what are the budgets actually, what are the opportunities, how much time an employee can have for education during his week, during his day. So you don't just have to give some solution, that they will come for two days and change your life, or for the weekend, which I think is complete nonsense, is to understand how a particular company works.

what steps can be taken to ensure that they are implanted in the activities of the company. Here we have an audit in the organization to better understand it, but more importantly, an audit of the competence of employees. We have conversations with everyone individually, whether it is an employee, whether it is a team, a person on the team, whether it is a leader, whether it is a manager. No matter the level of the position, we want to understand...

Kasia Szczesna (23:13.29)
his, her competences, where she is now, but also where she would like to be in a while. So we want to understand that point A that I mentioned earlier, but we also want to understand point B, where it's going. Therefore, it is very important to understand these two points and this path, which I really like about behavioral economics in general and in behavior design, that we talk about specifics, we talk about behaviors, about things that need to be done.

than just planning and hypothesizing. Here is the action that we have to do to go this very path from point A to point B. So the first stage is more in terms of understanding, in terms of auditing, which is also very opening for many people, because we often do not realize what competencies lie within us. We also don't know how we can lay this path.

together with your employer and work environment. Moreover, we can work as a team, so we can see how our team will develop, so not only we, but also the people around us, which can be very motivating and supportive for us, that our environment also pursues some specific goal, does it have some direction set, where we can support and motivate each other together, and as I mentioned before,

Human motivation, a look at how someone acts, a look at a person who is committed and shows value is wildly relevant to our motivation. So we have the first step, the second step is personalization. And personalization for the company, but also for the employee. Starting with the company, we support the company in understanding what the environment of choice looks like.

how can we design them so that sometimes some of the things we would like an employee to do don't require clicks. Maybe they should work from an automatic machine, and maybe we should put some barrier so that the employee can lean on it, but we also have to create the time that he needs. I usually give such laughs on the principle of reading the newsletter, doing internal trainings.

Kasia Szczesna (25:32.956)
on when they usually have to be done in the meantime. Yes, or any wellbing webinars that take place, and then the employee has to work these 12 hours so his way, but to raise his mental well-being, let him take our beautiful wellbing training. So these are such little things, I don't want to make fun of maybe this market either, but some things I think we're aware and informed enough that...

We need to translate this into the work of our organizations. What can we do there, what can we simplify? How to look at it as an environment of choice, an environment of emotions, an environment of the fact that we, for some things, have to rewrite the time on the calendar, and not just understand that our list of tasks is growing. So we help the company understand precisely how mechanisms work, how behaviors can be designed, how we can design precisely these paths of development.

so that the company not only does it in the perspective of three months, for example, when it has our support, but can also act on these points, on these advised elements later, so that it can apply them. So we argue here for an understanding in this positive and good sense of behavioral economics, not just in terms of persuasion and not just bends, but also, but above all...

good application in the context of employees. And looking on the other hand in the perspective of the employee, personalization is that we build this career path for him, we designate, we make an understanding, the first meeting usually, like a bear, it is part of the plan, the action, of telling ourselves about the expectations, about the barriers that may meet us. Everything that...

may be an element that can limit us in this cooperation. Determine the exact plan of how we will operate over the course of three months, for example the ten meetings we offer in Design Mentorship and what we strive for. So it's a very personalized path. Moreover, we also select a mentor in a personalized way.

Kasia Szczesna (27:49.432)
we also operate in such a spirit, in the perspective that not every company wants to have its external mentors, so if they are inside the company, of course we also take that into account. If the competence data is missing, the data of experts, then here we also offer support in the selection not only in terms of knowledge, not only in terms of the level of the person, because it is also necessary to take into account that not always the person who is 20 years from us...

has more experience of 20 years, sorry for overlanguaging, it will be the best choice for us. Not always this person can show us in clear steps where we should be going, because he already has a completely different perspective, so we also consider a person who will also be close to the person to explain clearly and clearly what these steps can look like.

and in terms of predisposition, in terms of personality, which I think is the most important thing in all of this. Of course, the components of level knowledge, of course, too, but if we do not find this chemistry, this flow with a given person, then we can get tired of these meetings. That is why it is so important for us to find a person who will

personally fit into cooperation, so we have a human factor here, a factor, as she told me, also manual strongly, because we can automate it in such perfect matchmaking, but from my own experience I know that it did not necessarily work out either, because we were making these attempts or, we can also do it faster, more automatically, but in the perspective of that time, despite the reduction of the matchmaking time,

Later it had very short legs, so I believe that if we prepare well for the start, then later it has a much greater effect, longer, long-term, not only in the context of mentoring, but later contact. Because many mentors and mentees come into contact with each other after years. Therefore, this human factor is very important for us. And the third step that we do, that is, we have the first understanding, the second personalization, the third...

Kasia Szczesna (30:11.294)
effectiveness and measurement. What I've been missing, and I'm not hiding our organization for a while, is how we're going in the mentoring process, in the development process, what's in store for us. Sometimes these are very personal topics and after several meetings we may not realize how much work we have done, therefore this feedback, summary of meetings,

analyzing how much we have gone through, what we have done, writing down our opinion, writing down our opinion, maybe not our recommendation, but just such a report from that meeting, what I came with, what I stayed with, and also the opinion of the mentor is very important to look at later in perspective, for example, these three months, what change we made.

And also to see in perspective, that's already saying a little backwards, but what is very important is that we stick to a certain direction, a plan and also to keep it in check, because that goal can also change. In the development and mentoring process, we also make a certain change. We have the right as a person in a mentee position not to know everything, because it is also this mentoring so that we learn and this goal...

can also change. Therefore, looking at where we are, where we are going, gives us here a strong attention to what is happening inside us, where we can change direction, because perhaps this process requires it. So this is one of those things that I think is left to itself in a lot of programs, in the developmental aspect in general, to...

look and have a hand on the pulse of where we are at a given stage. What's more, it's also crucial to that when we are going to give up, because you have to take into account that there are many factors, many stimuli that will distract us in this whole process, there will be ups and downs, not always and I think in most situations. We don't have clean environments when we have full time.

Kasia Szczesna (32:30.672)
money, emotions, we are sleepy or full. We also operate in different parts of the day where they are not the best for development and we would not like to do that, so this support of a person is very, very important. So this is what a three-step process looks like, which was created on the basis of and our experience, on the basis of...

information, research, reports from big players, companies that show that this development market needs to change, but also based on knowledge from behavioral economics and behavioral psychology how we can do it more effectively, not only look for cool tips on YouTube and best practices.

but to understand certain mechanisms that can affect our attention, our motivation, which will also give us great satisfaction. Because let's not hide, this is also a factor that is supposed to be at a high level for us if we enter a given development path. So I hope that with this recording I showed some stages of understanding, but also of the problem that we currently have in the market.

and also I would like us to look at this as opportunities rather than technological risks that we at this point, with such a market shift, can take, maybe it doesn't sound right, but take responsibility for designing our career path and I realize that responsibility is not an element here that can motivate us, but we can also create on our own terms.

or talk to our employer and I encourage companies that if they want to develop their companies, they bet on the proverbial right development horses rather than just following the standard that has been in place so far and I think that after talking to companies too, I know that it does not always have a measurable effect for the company, so let's act, let's do it effectively.

Kasia Szczesna (34:48.48)
but also with a dose that motivates and engages us and let's think about it well, because it will be our day and I encourage that this development and acquisition of new competencies be implanted in the day, not only at the weekend, not only in the quarterly or semi-annual training, but to be an element that gives us a kick for development.

Thank you very much and see you, see you.

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