Employees are rotated through various positions within or between departments as part of a job rotation program, giving them the chance to learn about various aspects of the company while developing and broadening their skill sets. While job rotations can have many benefits for both employers and employees, some parts of your organization will benefit more from them than others.
Key, high-potential employees are motivated by job rotations because they perceive them as a company investment in their future. They retain talent because they foster learning opportunities. There is a turnover risk if a talented employee doesn’t see any opportunities for advancement or if they are kept in the same role for too long. By switching managers and environments, you give that employee more challenges, test their ability to adapt, and help them develop new skills.
Job rotations broaden skills because they expose workers to various business functions. For instance, when a research and development employee transitions to a sales position, they gain more insight into establishing rapport with clients, comprehending their needs, and the sales process as a whole. Gaining a more complete understanding of how the company operates is advantageous to everyone involved.
Job rotations broaden employees’ networks in addition to their skill sets, further preparing them for leadership roles. Employees gain knowledge of the various working norms and cultures in each region, which promotes cooperation. They also give the business cross-functional capabilities, enabling it to call upon a pool of talent that is qualified to fill various functional roles in the event of an unexpected resignation or illness.
Solution: Identify the functional areas and departments appropriate for such a program. Just keep in mind that it might not be the best tool for developing the technical expertise your company requires, but it might work wonders for developing generalists and leaders. Creating a leadership track in addition to a specialty track might be the best of both worlds. Organizations “must have other ways to get specialist skills, such as using vendors for specialist tasks or using different career-management systems in technical areas,” as job rotation experts Lisa Cheraskin and Michael Campion explain in a Workforce Magazine article. “.
You’ll be moving an employee from a position where they are highly productive into one where they have a steep learning curve ahead of them, so you’ll need to offer more support when moving the employee into the new position who is now less competent. In the short term, as they provide coverage, the rotated employees’ new manager and coworkers might also find themselves less productive.
Solution: Define criteria to evaluate the results. How has the rotated employee used best practices from previous positions? How has the employee’s manager and team learned from the employee, and vice versa? These are all questions you should ask the rotated employee, their manager, and coworkers on a regular basis.
- Advantage: Rotation Deepens Skills. …
- Advantage: No More Stuck in a Rut. …
- Disadvantage: Employees May Resist. …
- Disadvantage: Training Requirements. …
- Disadvantage: Productivity Problems.
Types of rotational programs
To best meet the needs of the participants and the organization as a whole, rotational programs can take many different forms. Some of these options include:
Trainee programs
Organizations often design trainee programs with entry-level employees in mind. This kind of rotational program enables new hires to accept temporary positions in various departments in order to become as familiar with the company’s processes, procedures, and requirements as possible. This kind of rotational program might be the best choice for interns or anyone else employed by a company in a temporary capacity.
Job shadowing
Companies may offer trainees, interns, and other entry-level employees job shadowing opportunities. In this kind of rotational program, inexperienced or temporary employees work closely with an experienced colleague to quickly pick up the duties of a department. Additionally, other business mentoring programs may include job shadowing.
Job swapping
Job swapping may be the rotational program type that most people associate with when they hear the term. In this model, current workers at the company can choose to switch departments or seniority levels for a set period of time in order to gain new skills. This kind of program could run across multiple departments or within a single division of an organization.
Project work
Project work may occasionally be categorized as a rotational program, despite not typically being one. Project managers can put together a team for specific accounts so that various employees can collaborate to finish a task or deliver a project to a client. If each new project team is composed of a different group of workers, you can classify this work as rotational.
Job visiting
Job visiting may take on different meanings for different organizations. When an employee is job visiting, they may continue to perform some of their regular responsibilities while also taking on some new ones from a related role. In other situations, job visiting may entail moving between job sites or other office locations within an organization so that employees can work with various people in various roles.
What are rotational programs?
As part of the job design or job redesign process, rotational programs are an employment strategy that enables people to work in more than one job at the same company. Employees who participate in job rotation programs get the chance to try out new duties in a different role for a predetermined amount of time before returning to the position for which they were initially hired.
Instead of receiving temporary promotions, participants in job rotation programs typically move laterally to positions on the same staffing or management level. However, following a job rotation program, some employees might be given consideration for promotions after showcasing their expanded skill sets in diverse fields.
Pros of rotational programs
Participating in rotational program models has a number of advantages for both businesses and employees. Some of these advantages include:
Creating excitement
Employee engagement in their regular work can be maintained by giving them the opportunity to take on new or different responsibilities within an organization. This could keep them from becoming bored over time and enable them to switch up their activities to take on new challenges and experiences without putting in extra effort or by switching careers. For instance, a marketing company might implement a rotational program that permits its content writers to temporarily double as content editors in order to increase their skill sets and diversify their workload.
Encouraging development
Employees may be given the opportunity to learn new skills through the creation of rotational program models within an organization, both related to and unrelated to their primary jobs. This can give them the impression that their managers are concerned about their professional development. Additionally, it may increase their sense of value to a company and possibly aid in employee retention.
Creating breaks
In some industries, implementing a rotational program structure could provide workers with much-needed breaks. This may be the case for those who work physically or mentally hard every day, such as those in heavy labor or thought-intensive careers. You can decrease fatigue, which can boost productivity and prevent burnout by allowing these workers to switch to other, less taxing tasks.
Creating contingency plans
Even though implementing rotational programs may have employee retention as one of its goals, some employees do occasionally leave a company for legitimate reasons related to their health, families, or other circumstances. You might be able to create backup plans for filling open positions temporarily by encouraging job rotation.
While you look for a replacement, other staff members who are familiar with the procedures and obligations of a vacant position might be able to assume some of those responsibilities. If they do the work, you can take more time to find someone who is a good fit for the job rather than finding someone who is qualified but less ideal to step in right away.
Helping employees find the best fit
Employees may discover strengths or skills that their managers weren’t aware of by being given the opportunity to try out different jobs within the same organization. Through this kind of program, you might discover that your employees are more qualified for positions other than the ones you initially hired them for. You can boost efficiency and effectiveness throughout all processes and procedures by allowing some employees to change positions permanently.
Building employee networks
Moving between teams or departments can introduce staff to new coworkers and managers. As a result, the company’s employee networks may develop on a deeper level. Getting to know new people from various departments can encourage teamwork on accounts or projects. Team members may encounter other work cultures or styles within these new networks, which could affect how they perform once they return to their original roles.
Aligning competencies and requirements
Employees may gain a better understanding of how other departments and people work and how it relates to their primary position by working with a variety of people and in different departments. From a planning standpoint, this can assist in coordinating industry standards, competencies, and other demands across various departments. For instance, the human resources department may use a quality assurance checklist to evaluate potential new hires, which someone in sales may learn about. The salesperson might then adapt that checklist to use it when vetting potential leads and clients.
Keeping details in focus
Employers can assist staff members in maintaining perspective by implementing a job rotation program. When people perform the same tasks every day, they may become accustomed to certain aspects of the routine or discover ways to reduce their effort or save time on a particular project. This could result in missing some smaller details. To learn new techniques or demonstrate their versatility to their managers, temporary employees may, however, be more likely to adhere to rules and strict guidelines during a job rotation cycle. This could ensure that they take into account and meet all requirements.
Cons of rotational programs
Additionally, implementing a rotational program plan at your company may present some difficulties. Some of these issues may include:
Proving to be costly
It’s possible that offering rotational programs within an organization would be more expensive than the more conventional model of sticking with one role. This might be the case because rotational programs are sometimes used as a means of providing on-the-job training, which may involve expenses for creating or printing manuals and other help materials or offering incentives at kickoff or closing lunches or meetings. You may also incur additional expenses in sectors that use specialized machinery or software, such as hiring qualified technicians or operators to come and train new hires on how to operate the equipment safely or purchasing additional licenses for software.
Proving to be time-consuming
Implementing a rotational program scheme may take some time because many specialized jobs require a lot of technical knowledge and skills that employees must acquire before succeeding in their roles. In some positions, learning even the most fundamental skills could take weeks or months, despite the fact that you might be able to have shorter rotation cycles in fields like human resources, administration, or content creation.
Inviting frustration
It’s possible that not all staff members will be eager to participate in a rotational program. Employees may decline to participate in these initiatives for a variety of reasons, such as anxiety, comfort with their current position, or uncertainty about their performance in other areas of the business. If you decide to offer a rotational program, think about making it optional so that workers who enjoy change can participate and those who are happy in their current positions can stay in those positions.
Encouraging job generalization
Employees may feel that you are encouraging job generalization rather than job specialization by encouraging them to learn a wide variety of basic skills for a wide variety of jobs. Reinforce the notion that learning fundamental skills in a variety of fields may actually help them become more specialized at their primary position when introducing your rotational program structure.
Fixing only some problems
Job rotation can promote excitement and professional growth, but there may be other issues that employees may encounter that you may not be able to address by using this strategy. Some of those might be the need for a complete career change, issues in one’s personal life, or health issues. Even in fields unaffected by rotational programs, fostering a warm and open corporate culture may make team members feel more comfortable discussing the difficulties they face at work and promote retention.
Affecting business negatively
Employees may make mistakes as they develop new skills as part of the growth process. This might result in production or customer service errors, depending on your industry. Make sure you have policies and procedures in place to permit participants in rotational programs to make mistakes that won’t harm your business or reputation. For instance, customer service representatives working at a help desk might inform callers that they are in training and ask for their patience.
Proving to be industry-specific
Job rotation programs might not be feasible in every organization or industry. In the context of job rotation, you might not be able to convert a copywriter into a coder in a matter of weeks. Because of this, the majority of job rotation programs make use of lateral moves within the same teams or seniority structures. Examine your departments, divisions, and staff to see if this framework makes sense for your organization and if it could implement this kind of program.
Tips for a successful job rotation program
Follow these guidelines to develop a productive job rotation program for your team or business:
Talk to your employees
Before you launch the program, explain to your staff why you are providing this incentive. Stress that this is to help their growth and development. This kind of meeting could enable team members to clarify the plan and ask questions before it starts.
Create a schedule
Make a document that informs employees of where, when, and for how long they will be changing positions. This can help ease anxiety and insecurity about the move. Before the program starts, it might also provide staff with an additional opportunity to ask questions.
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FAQ
Are rotational programs worth it?
A NACE survey found that, in general, companies with a rotational program had nearly a 20% higher first-year retention rate than companies without a rotational program After five years, companies with a rotational program saw a 10% higher retention rate than companies without a rotational program
What are the disadvantages of rotation?
- Encourages job generalization (rather than specialization)
- Workers with experience may be hesitant or unwilling to rotate and learn new skills.
- lack of job variety to reduce exposure to MSD hazards and muscle wasting
- Time required to acquaint workers to a new process.
What is the purpose of rotational programs?
Rotation programs assist new hires in becoming familiar with the numerous moving parts of an organization and in determining where their skills fit best. They also help employees develop skills across organizational functions.
What are the benefits of rotation?
- Improved employee knowledge of company operations.
- Reduced boredom among employees.
- Increased innovation from employees.
- Identified employee interests and skills in new areas.
- Reduced strain on employees physically.
- Increased productivity.
