Shadowing, secondments and swaps: the development you can arrange yourself.
When people say the job stopped stretching them, they usually mean they have stopped seeing anything new. A day somewhere else does more than a course, and you can arrange it with one phone call.
Three shapes (a day, a few weeks, a swap), one phone call to another manager, and ten minutes afterwards for the team.
Training budgets are not yours. Another manager’s time is, if you ask. A day shadowing a different team, a week’s secondment, a swap between two people in different functions: these cost little beyond cover, take one conversation to arrange, and change how someone sees their own job.
Three shapes
- A shadowing day. One person spends a day with another team, watching and asking. Best for curiosity and for people who are about to work with that team.
- A short secondment. One to four weeks doing a real job elsewhere. Best for people who are ready for more and for whom there is no vacancy yet.
- A swap. Two people change places for a day or a week. Best for two teams that complain about each other.
Arranging it
- Ask the person what they would like to see, not where you think they should go.
- Ring the other manager yourself and offer something back: a day for one of theirs with your team. It is quicker than any process.
- Agree what the person will do and who will look after them. A shadow with nobody to shadow is a day wasted.
- Ask the person to tell your team what they saw. Ten minutes, informally. That is where the value lands for everyone else.
Every six months, one person
That is enough. Keep a list of who has been where, and make sure it goes round.
The clearest thirty minutes in your week.
Send us your last engagement survey and we’ll show you what it’s missing – no charge, no deck, no obligation. Or start with a pilot or a 30-minute conversation.