If you’re creating a development plan
built around on-the-job experience,
you can make it a better plan and
avoid some common pitfalls
by using our Experience Model.
The idea is a simple, but powerful one.
You can think about any work experience
using two fundamental dimensions:
Intensity and Stretch.
Intensity describes the extent to which
a situation requires you to face
more performance demands than
you’ve faced before.
Intensity comes from a number of sources:
When these components of Intensity are
at high levels, they become
Learning Drivers and present you
with both challenges
and opportunities to learn.
Stretch describes the extent to which
a situation requires you to face
different performance demands than
you’ve faced before...to be successful
you need to learn new and different things,
often in unfamiliar areas.
Stretch comes from a number of sources.
When these components of Stretch
are at high levels, they also become
Learning Drivers and present you
with both challenges
and opportunities to learn.
If you put these two dimensions together,
you create the Experience Model
which outlines four types of experience.
As you start writing a development plan
built around on-the-job experience,
the model can help you to quickly see
two critical things:
First, based on the amount of
Intensity and Stretch in an opportunity,
the Better Development Plans tool will
tell you the Type of experience it will be
and what that means for you.
This can help you decide if an experience
is right for you. If you take on that
assignment you’ve been thinking about,
will it be a Mastering Experience for you?
And, importantly, do you need
more Mastering?
Second, when you use the
Better Development Plans tool to profile
a development opportunity, you gain
insight into the most critical
Learning Drivers, specifically for you.
Where will the biggest sources
of learning come from? Are there
some risks you should also keep in mind
before taking on this opportunity?
In just a few minutes with the tool, you’ll have
everything you need to create your own
better development plans.