As change and volatility continue to challenge organizations of all sizes, scales, and industries worldwide, the resulting pressures on those holding leadership and management roles multiply. The rapidly shifting platforms from which companies operate, from commercial and financial markets to enabling technologies and labor forces, are forcing those responsible for guiding the organizations and teams to play a game of Tetris, fitting the various pieces together to meet objectives. When those pieces change their size and shape, the skill levels required often overwhelm the capabilities of many. Thus, management career requirements are becoming increasingly difficult to navigate successfully. At the same time, those jobs have become less attractive options to many workers, thinning the talent pools available, while the demand for skilled worker retention has increased. Dual career tracks offer a solution to this conundrum by offering comparable career and compensation growth options for individual contributors (IC) at middle-to-senior levels in the organization.

The issue with leaders and managers

The effectiveness of managers and leaders has been identified as a major capability gap across industries, which is especially concerning given the impact those roles have on strategic, operational, and talent objectives. DDI has found what it labels “a leadership crisis”, with only 40% of companies saying they have high-quality leaders, and less than 50% of employees “trust their manager to do what is right”. Other surveys have found that 75% of employees said their managers were ineffective, and 60% of new managers fail within their first two (2) years on the job. 

Gallup's research shows that only 10% of existing managers have the right blend of skills, capabilities, and traits for successful team leadership, while its previous studies found that those managers' decisions, actions, and behaviors are responsible for 70% of employee engagement levels. Given its latest assessment that only 31% of workers are engaged (and 17% actively disengaged) at work, the management and leadership selection choices organizations make need to be questioned. 

Because these indices have been persistently low, HR leaders should ask more probing questions about how work is guided, by whom, and whether expanded dual career tracks can support the retention of great technical contributors.

Employee interest in managerial roles is waning

At the same time that the quality of managerial staffing is being scrutinized, an increasing number of workers across job families are hesitant to consider moving into those roles. A recent report from Aerotek found that 41% of job seekers have stated no interest in managerial jobs, instead preferring to further develop their skills, have more schedule, location, and task flexibility, and discover more interesting career path options.

Similar insights focused on generational differences were reported, with 40% of Gen Z (and 32% of Millennials) workers aspiring to promotions without managerial responsibilities. 59% of employees across generation segments reported greater satisfaction from performing individual tasks over managing others.

Industry reporting increasingly indicates that management and leadership roles no longer hold the same allure to today’s workers as in previous generations. In their place are specialized SME roles that allow continued growth and development of skills learned, advanced, and honed through years of experience in a selected or related field or profession. Such roles also support what is perceived as a better work-life balance, a major driver of employee engagement, satisfaction, and turnover. 

The time has come to expand such opportunities with dual career tracks, given the challenges of retaining critically skilled employees and adopting AI, both of which require institutional knowledge and expertise and can be best addressed by avoiding the pressure to place top performers into unwanted management roles.

The reasons to establish or increase the availability of dual career tracks

Despite the historical draw of managerial roles that offer higher status, authority, discretion, and compensation, the jobs are widely understood to be challenging, stressful, and notorious for their politically charged risks. With fewer employees interested in the roles and the turnover of skilled employees a strategic barrier to achieving business objectives, understanding the chief drivers for increasing the use and reliance upon dual career paths includes:

Leaders and managers are generalist roles that require a wide range of skills

The range of tasks and responsibilities that a leader or manager is required to fulfill encompasses an equally broad array of skills that are difficult to find in a single individual. While leaders are required to develop and communicate effective strategies that drive market, financial, operational, talent, and customer success, managers must operationalize those strategies, translating them into executable goals, processes, practices, and programs. In turn, both job levels must:

• Develop and communicate organizational mission, vision, and strategies.
• Distribute duties, responsibilities, and goals to functions, business units, teams, and individuals.
• Establish objectives, strategies/tactics, and standards, adapting those to meet changing market, customer, and stakeholder conditions and expectations.
• Assess, hire, deploy, and manage the performance of individuals and teams.
• Initiate, budget, and manage development and/or improvement projects.
• Coach and mentor individuals and teams with varying combinations of skills and proficiencies, strengths and weaknesses, personal traits, and work styles. 
• Evaluate performance and contributions objectively and fairly, compare those against standards and peers, provide effective feedback, and course correct as needed.
• Collaborate, coordinate, and manage conflicts with other leaders, functions, and organizations (internal and external) to innovate, enhance, and achieve shared goals.
• Inspire, recognize, and reward individuals and teams with differing preferences, motivators, and expectations.
• Provide technical subject matter expertise to various strategy, product, service, process, initiative, and project efforts.
  
  

The time and effort requirements of those roles can overwhelm

It has become a well-established fact of life for leaders and managers that “their time is not their own”, with demands coming from above, below, and outside. McKinsey reported on research that shed light on this, with 44% of middle managers stating that they were unable to complete their talent-related duties because of bureaucratic requirements that take up 49% of their time.

Pair with that what Wowledge leadership development and transition expert and contributor Stephanie Quarls identifies as the five critical roles of leaders :

• Coach
• Creator
• Champion
• Conductor
• Caretaker

Consider how many skills and requirements these role-holders have to balance. It is especially difficult for leaders and managers in industries where the majority of the talent pool from which future leaders emerge is educated, developed, and rewarded for their primarily technical capabilities. These include fields such as technology, science, medicine, finance, engineering, manufacturing, construction, and other industries where “soft skills” are less commonly held and/or developed until they arrive at managerial opportunities.

Leadership and managerial skills gaps continue to be problematic

The shortcomings of leaders and managers have been widely studied, examined, and published, making it clear that many, if not most, are ill-equipped to guide and manage others. The previously referenced Gallup research has led that organization to pronounce that 82% of managers should never have been hired. The surprisingly high level presence of “toxic leaders” only adds to the conundrum, with studies reporting that between 10-15% of leaders and managers exhibit “destructive” behaviors. 

The Harris Poll found that a remarkable majority (69%) of managers reported discomfort communicating with employees, which supports other studies that have demonstrated leaders and managers lack confidence in their ability to handle the responsibilities that accompany leading others. At the same time, gaps between current skill shortcomings and company leadership development offerings reveal what many leaders say is insufficient support to improve their leadership of others. 

Even further challenges emerge from the need to lead, manage, and constantly adapt to turbulence and constant change in commercial, financial, and labor markets. Creating strategic responses to these, while subsequently guiding, directing, and supporting others through massive upheavals in technological advancements and associated work process shifts, is just too much for many. 

When adding these into the increasing preference of many employees to avoid managerial responsibilities while continuing to grow professionally, develop deeper and broader skills and capabilities, and advance their status, grade, and pay levels, offering dual career tracks and opportunities offers substantial benefits. They offer hope for having fewer, but more capable leaders and managers guiding better-equipped process, functional, and professional experts at the mid-to-senior levels.

Defining dual career tracks

The uptake of all the preceding insights is that not everyone is well suited, motivated, or capable of taking on management roles. At the same time, retaining technically proficient subject matter experts supports more stable and sustainable strategic capabilities needed to meet and advance enterprise objectives. The question that remains is how to best design an ecosystem that leverages those employees’ capabilities AND their aspirations for professional growth, career advancement, and access to financial and status rewards? 

Dual career tracks (also referred to as “paths”, “ladders”, or “lattices”) refer to structured and formalized advancement opportunities for individual contributor (IC) roles at increasingly higher levels of the organization, comparable in level, status, autonomy, and compensation to those in the leadership/management progression. They are designed to encourage and support the development of the deep functional expertise organizations need today.

Despite the apparent conflict or inconsistency in labeling, dual career tracks take form with three options for career path and role option choices:

Leadership/management track 

A progression of roles with responsibilities related to establishing strategic direction, defining, directing, and evaluating the work and development of others, managing work processes, and administering systems and budgets. Advancement is tied to criteria such as success in team/unit production, quality, growth, innovation, and the individual’s strategic capabilities.

Specialist/technical track

Individual contributor roles aligned with progressively higher levels of skill depth and breadth, problem-solving complexity, development of new models, approaches, and products/services, and internal and external reputation. Advancement is driven by meeting or exceeding criteria related to skills proficiency mastery, introduction of innovations, knowledge and use of advanced techniques, ability to resolve highly complex issues, and guidance/development of less skilled colleagues.

Hybrid/lattice track

The movement between management and specialist tracks as skills, motivation, and business or operational needs require. This provides staffing flexibility for the organization while enabling highly skilled and multi-talented individuals to take on a variety of roles and challenges that suit their capabilities and aspirations. It is an effective development path for high-potential (HiPo) employees, who can gain professional depth by switching between specialized assignments or projects and skills or experience breadth through team or project management roles.

The benefits of establishing or broadening access to dual career tracks

Creating formal career tracks offers an array of benefits to the organization and its most valued performers. It creates an environment and ecosystem that flexes as enterprise priorities arise or shift, employee preferences and aspirations evolve, and supports the search for the “best fit” between people and available jobs. The value proposition of dial career tracks includes: 

• Improves employee retention among highly skilled technical and specialized talent whose value proposition is deemed to be strategically crucial.
• Enables the development of broader and deeper skills, as different jobs can provide experiential development of one or the other by enabling access to roles that provide direction or cross-functional support to multiple business units, operations, or functions.
• Expands corporate capabilities by increasing the skills and expertise base of a greater number of employees whose most significant contributions can be made in a technical sphere of influence. 
• Supports innovation and continuous improvement through a more intensified problem identification and solving focus by dedicated senior-level subject matter experts on business, financial, operational, and talent topics. It is further enhanced by the natural growth in collaboration supported by the development of broader internal and external networks. 
• Relieves overburdened middle and senior managers of technical contribution requirements that often are part of their roles. A hybrid model can also provide a career break from the demands of leadership and management roles without loss of status and self-esteem.
• Creates a platform for increased individual choice and opportunity to fulfill career and financial aspirations without being “forced” to move into roles for which individuals are less suited and motivated. 
• Enables career flexibility as personal and life-stage situations and circumstances change, allowing a shift in role requirements and demands without harming long-term career prospects.
  
  

Designing dual career tracks that drive desired talent and business outcomes

Establishing dual career paths that simultaneously support business and operational requirements (e.g., targeted expertise deployment) and critical talent outcomes (e.g., key player retention, development) calls for a comprehensive and disciplined approach. Because career movement and advancement touch many aspects of both operational and talent processes, this should be designed as an ecosystem with supporting infrastructure that enables alignment with strategic objectives, consistent application, fair and equitable access and treatment, and cultural acceptance.

1. Develop a strategy and executive governance 

Define the “why”, “what”, and “how” dual career tracks will be established, designed, and implemented. Engage leadership support, creating oversight that encourages employee selection and deployment, allows choices with minimal disruptions, and institutionalizes it as a development approach at all levels. Create a governance infrastructure that engages top leadership, provides visibility into its use (and potential misuse), and sets standards so it can be championed, made culturally acceptable, supported, and encouraged.

2. Identify value-add responsibilities that contribute to critical company objectives 

Survey the organization’s strategic priorities and identify where associated capability gaps, shortcomings, or emerging requirements exist. Consider the question “What do we want to be known for by our stakeholders, customers, future employees? “Where and in what ways could our inputs and outputs be improved by a greater level or concentration of technical expertise?” Conduct this review in each function, business unit, and operation, and identify the priority capabilities that would benefit from the addition of deeper or broader knowledge, experience, and maturity.

3. Identify roles that build or add critical capabilities 

In each prioritized function or operation, identify the level of expertise and proficiency required, and the number (by job family) needed to deliver the continuous expertise, innovation development, and mentoring that senior-level ICs would offer. The goal for these roles is to identify and syndicate new thinking, methods, and approaches to be applied to that unit’s processes, practices, and outputs. Identify how many people at each (experience and grade) level could be applied to such capability enhancement and add the value needed.

4. Design the jobs 

Specialist roles often focus on researching and designing new products, services, or approaches; improving work processes; testing and introducing innovative technologies and tools; and managing special projects and initiatives. As such, a formal job design process should be conducted to define responsibilities and how they will be deployed on an ongoing basis. Given their ultimate job leveling comparable to a Sr. Manager, Director, or VP, an essential element is to ensure that the roles have increased autonomy, with defined decision-making authority related to how, when, and in what order the work is conducted and the approach to be taken in performing their tasks.

5. Restructure the organization(s)

Creating dual career tracks comes with an important caveat: labor costs must be taken into account when creating new roles, especially given their relative organizational and associated compensation levels. A common tradeoff is to resize the management team, as the increase in number and level of technical experts will naturally reduce those contribution and oversight responsibilities of existing managers and leaders. Fewer managers and leaders who are better skilled, motivated, and suited for those roles can equate to better talent outcomes (e.g., engagement, retention, performance).

6. Establish job titles with comparable status

Identify titles that communicate comparable (though not necessarily equivalent) and desirable markers of organizational value and status. The education, experience, skills, and proficiency levels should be similar to those of their job-level counterparts (Sr. Managers, Director, Vice President) within the organization and against comparative roles in the relevant labor markets. Title options should be created as a progression in line with comparable management or leadership roles using terms paired with the job function (e.g., Principal Marketing Strategist, Lead Researcher, Procurement Consultant, Engineering Fellow, HR Specialist Leader, or Manufacturing Innovation VP).

7. Adapt the job architecture 

The organization’s job architecture should be updated to establish job classification levels, skills overlaps and adjacencies, and parallel pathways at each (or many) job levels where managerial and leadership roles now exist. The key is to update this in a way that enables and supports movement between leadership and IC paths.

8. Update the compensation strategy 

Use compensation techniques to identify salary benchmarks, and interpolate between comparable roles where the newly created jobs do not distinctly exist at scale in the marketplace. Place the jobs in salary bands, and assign market-based bonus and equity incentive opportunities appropriate for jobs at a level similar to their leadership-track peers. Key to this are policies that enable and support movement between leadership and IC paths, although maintaining equivalency is difficult as roles and responsibilities rise in the organization.

9. Establish formal guidelines, standards, and criteria

The new roles should be designed, and their membership managed carefully to avoid overpopulation and replacement of other mobility/advancement options, while maintaining their allure as special. Expectations for performance in these higher-level jobs must be significantly higher and more demanding than other individual contributor roles. The key is to identify and formalize the performance standards that deliver the business and financial value that justify awarding higher compensation. Examples of the requirements might include representing the company in professional conferences, developing new concepts or innovative products/services, or introducing improved work methods.

10. Enable career-long skills and career assessments

Using skills-based approaches to evaluate, promote, and move people on or off one track or another offers a more refined and detailed approach to managing employees under dual career tracks. When combined with career discussions that collect and track career aspirations, skills-based development, and performance management, these elements can be used to assess ongoing management or leadership effectiveness, gains or flattening in skills growth, and the presence and proficiency levels of unique skill and experiential mixes that meet a new operational requirement.

11. Measure the utilization, effectiveness, and value of the ecosystem

As with every HR process, policy, or practice, evaluating its impact is essential to identifying the extent to which it is achieving its objectives and meeting its value proposition. Relevant metrics should be identified for dashboards so top leaders can evaluate how it is being used, the success it is achieving, and, most importantly, the impact it has on prioritized talent outcomes, operational outcomes, and business and financial results.

Relevant Practices & Tools

Core Career Development Practices that Translate Employee Ambitions into Occupational Progression Action Plans. >

Core Career Development is a process through which employee development is guided towards a targeted series of successive job roles that build upon one another and provide continued growth and challenge over the years... more »

Developing Leaders Across Multiple Levels of Management. >

Advanced leadership development is designed to not only develop current executives, but "leaders" in all levels of the organization... more »

Identifying Standardized Criteria and Recommending Successor Candidates with Potential for Higher-level Positions. >

Once the positions to be planned for are determined and documented, criteria for selection and a list of potential successors for each role can be determined... more »

Developing Multiple and Objective Selection Criteria for Replacement Candidates. >

Succession management is essentially a prediction of the future. As such, the adoption of formal, structured criteria for determining successors and HIPOs is a key element in ensuring a more accurate succession management process... more »

The Success Profile Tool: Specify the Background, Skills, and Capabilities Expected from Individuals in Key Roles. >

A template resembling a job description further detailed with the competencies and useful experiences that separate minimum job requirements from the attributes and experiences of an individual who is viewed as highly likely to be highly successful in the role... more »