EYU-A Unique Development Plan The individual development framework, EYU, reflects the mutual commitment between Ernst \& Young and its employees. It is the commitment of the organisation to support its employees in achieving their potential, and the commitment of the employees towards taking responsibility for and owning their careers. Fig.6.2 depicts the EYU framework. It links the business context to individual development needs and forms the Unique Development Plan, which comprises actions along three basic elements referred to as three pillars: Learning, Experiences and Coaching. While the business context is determined by clients, the business and the needs of the communities Ernst \& Young serves; individual requirements are determined by the roles, competencies and development needs of the employees. The Competency Framework of Ernst \& Young is at the core of EYU. Every employee assesses him or herself on the competency framework followed by an assessment by his or her manager. Gaps are identified with respect to the current and required competencies based on which a Unique Development Plan is arrived at for each individual. Over 95 percent of employees at Ernst \& Young have defined their unique development plan based on the EYU framework. Learning EYU-learning provides employees with access to high quality softskill, technical and web-based training tailored to match their development needs. A dedicated L\&D team is responsible for in-house development of soft skills trainings courseware as well as delivery of training programmes. This is a practice driven by the belief that internal people understand the culture better, are able to relate to specific work scenarios and provide more relevant examples, making learning more effective. Some of the courses are mandatory, whereas others are role and milestone based programmes which every individual needs to take upon reaching particular levels in their career. Fig. 6.2 Ernst \& Young and U Being a knowledge enterprise, technical training also plays a key role in defining the learning spectrum. From a new graduate to an experienced partner, EY offers its employees a comprehensive range of technical skills development programmes that can be classified into solutions, methodologies, sector and industry specific training. Experiences At the next level, assignments are identified for the individual to get hands-on experience in the identified area of development. The organisation invests significant time on EYU experiences, as they are a very critical pillar of this programme. Experiences provide an opportunity to put knowledge into practice and develop new skills using a set of nine high-impact experiences comprising customised activities. These experiences are: 1. Service line specific experiences 2. Quality service delivery 3. Account development 4. Coaching 5. Leading change 6. Recruiting 7. Building a professional brand 8. Community responsibility 9. Mobility Experiences do not involve any direct monetary expenditure like training. However, they do involve investment in terms of time and effort of the managers who are required to create relevant learning experiences, match it to the development needs of the employee, monitor and review progress on an ongoing basis. Coaching At Ernst \& Young, coaching is a meaningful conversation that helps transform learning and experiences into practical application on the job. In the EYU programme, every people manager is trained to be a counsellor or a coach for his or her direct reportees. The organisation gives high regard to the role of a coach and places a great deal of emphasis on ongoing sensitisation on the 'role of counsellor' and people responsibilities of a manager. There are regular programmes to train all people managers on giving effective feedback, coaching skills, development and continuous career development of employees. The framework of learning, experiences and coaching can be explained through a simple example. Presentation skills are essential to the role of a consultant, and enhancing skills on designing and delivering presentations can be a developmental need for an individual. The learning pillar of EYU framework comes into play, when an individual picks up an instructor led or web-based soft skill training course on Presentation Skills. Under the experiences framework, relevant activities can be identified, wherein the manager provides opportunities for the employee to make presentations to an internal or external audience. The employee is also allowed to shadow the managers to learn how they go about making presentations. Further, under the coaching umbrella, the manager, who is also the coach, shares guidelines and tips on making effective presentations. By discussing some of his own experiences and learning, the coach can help his counselee work on the identified developmental need. Beyond Career Paths-Creating Career Experiences Ernst \& Young's talent development framework extends beyond just equipping an individual for his or her current role. It also aims to provide every individual with the skills needed to become successful in future roles. Career conversations were initiated as a new tool, with the objective of helping employees identify and articulate their short and long-term career aspirations and develop a framework to help individuals achieve them. Career conversations are meaningful, future focussed interactions around an employee's career aspirations and how the firm can support in aligning these with business needs. Career conversations help people explore and understand their individual career interests and also review where they are in their careers and how they want to progress. In order to make discussions around performance and career aspirations more impactful, EY introduced the concept of TRIO meetings. In TRIO meetings, the reporting partner has a joint discussion with the individual and his or her counsellor to understand the individual's performance levels, development needs and career planning. These meetings not only help leadership get visibility and develop a connect with every member in their team, but also go a long way in reinforcing leadership's commitment to people's growth and development. Based on these conversations, every employee has his or her unique development plan that not only helps the person to perform better in their current role but also work towards the future role they aspire to achieve. For example, a Tax Advisor might aspire to move into Mergers \& Acquisitions. Upon engaging in a career conversation with his counsellor, the individual can work towards developing a road map to enable this transition. The counsellor can thus help identify and articulate an action plan to help the individual take up the new role. This may include undergoing formal and structured learning programmes on financial modelling skills and understanding M\&A business. A counsellor can also mobilise a short-term secondment to the M\&A team, to give the individual real time exposure. This will help the individual make a more informed choice about the movement. The above example demonstrates that the focus is not only on creating career paths but also on providing opportunities for employees to have a career experience that enables them to make meaningful decisions. Ernst \& Young believes that when its people achieve their best, it can help its clients achieve their best too. Today's Interns Tomorrow's Leaders-Not an Impossible Dream Internal leadership development is another high priority area at Ernst \& Young. EY takes pride in the fact that almost all of its senior leadership is home grown. Every year, a good number of partners are added to the leadership, which gives tremendous confidence to employees who dream of growing into senior leadership positions. Leadership development at Ernst \& Young happens through diverse sets of programmes at various levels. To begin with, the organisation has a series of development and celebration programmes organised for newly promoted managers, senior managers, and partners. The objective is to emphasise the importance of their role and equip them with skills that can help them transition successfully into their new role. As part of its leadership development agenda, senior managers identified to move into partnership or leadership roles in future participate in a "Leadership Track Development Workshop" (LTDW). LTDW uses a development centre methodology to do a realistic evaluation of potential strengths and development areas of the target group. It clarifies leadership role expectations and gives participants a solid understanding of the firm's business and strategy. The facilitator group consists of experts from around the world and skilled professional actors to engage participants in role-plays. The L\&D team and the leadershipgroup observe, assess and give feedback to participants. An example of a typical simulation covered in the workshop would be, "A chance meeting with a person in the lift who appears to be a potential client. You are required to introduce Ernst \& Young to the person and make sure that in the next four minutes you convert him or her into a client." Such situations, which are easy to imagine but difficult to handle appropriately, are simulated in a learning environment for senior managers to acquire specific skills at the development centre. Partners are the highest level of leadership in Ernst \& Young. Globally and in India, candidates with potential to be partners are selected through a highly structured and rigorous process called Global Next Gen. This programme builds the skills and capabilities through three experiential leadership challenges focused on our markets, our business and our people. It aims to create new partners with strong market leadership skills, a global mindset, wide networks and a broad understanding of the business. Starting a couple of years in advance, the identified employees participate in various forums and provide inputs on different initiatives and organisational processes. Ernst \& Young lays strong emphasis on Succession Planning to build a robust and diverse leadership pipeline. The company takes into account both the available slots and people within the organisation to ensure that the necessary resources are identified and are ready for any existing or future positions that are or may become vacant. What's Next? EY has always endorsed a strong need to provide its people with the best possible development opportunities and challenging experiences to help them evolve into leaders within the firm, profession and communities at large. Building further on the leadership development framework to groom future leaders will continue to be a focus area for EY. The spotlight will also be on adding more meaningful offerings to its already well-established bouquet of learning and development opportunities. SHRM India's Conclusion The talent development framework focuses on a holistic competency development programme. Given that competencies are understood to be a combination of knowledge, skills and attitude, the individual development plan in EYU, through its three pillars of learning, experiences and coaching, can be seen as a unique way to build competencies. Learning is provided through training programmes designed to deliver the required knowledge; experiences help in acquiring the necessary skills and coaching brings in the required ability and attitude. By emphasising on these three pillars, the framework helps to ensure that the unique development plan translates into meaningful action and provides the requisite business results. EYU is four years old and ever since its implementation, has played a key role in nurturing employees' professional growth and development. The strong business case for people development and high engagement levels within the company contribute significantly to the success of the programme. The robust online system which helped ensure compliance, reporting and provides continual feedback on the progress was a key driver in the successful deployment of the programme. Strong leadership endorsement and an explicit value proposition of this programme have helped E\&Y meet its objective of helping today's professionals grow into tomorrow's leaders. After reading the attached case study, prepare a summary report addressing the following points: 1. Investment perspective in HRM being followed by this organization. 2. Financial viability of these interventions. 3. Strategic management techniques being followed by this organization with reference to HRM. 4. Recommendation for the way ahead. (The report can be in doc, pdf, jpeg, ppt file format. Handwritten reports can be scanned and uploaded. Word limit range: 1000-1500. No plagiarism. No extension in deadline will be allowed.)