June 12, 2010

Stability or Mobility?

Posted by Bizaholic | 11:17 PM | with 0 comments »

Is staying too long with a company good or bad? Is mobility in career essential for growth? These are the questions I am grappling with.

There are no right or wrong answers for these questions. It's a gray area where the correct answer will vary from company to company depending upon the internal and external factors affecting it.

There are instances when a company hires people from outside who have similar experience and talent as the inside guy at higher grade and remuneration package. The company in such cases takes the loyal insider for granted and frequently overlooked. It becomes an issue of unfair treatment where the guy who is coming from outside is treated like a royalty while the internal guy despite better talent and expertise seems to lose out.

Then there are instances when the growth of a manager becomes stagnant. If a company cannot provide challenging roles to its managers on a regular basis, chances are high that the manager's learning will suffer and he will get trapped in a well from where he cannot have a proper view of the other world.

There is yet another trap associated with working for long in a single company. One tends to get into a comfort zone. The problem with comfort zones is that if one enters it, it is extremely difficult to get out from it. Comforts zone spoils a manager and drastically affects the manager's ability to adjust in a new role and a new environment.

Here are few pointers which should guide one in deciding whether to stick to the company for long or move on to better opportunities in other company -
  1. As long as the company is providing new growth opportunities at regular interval, there is no harm in staying with it.
  2. When there is clear indication that learning curve is becoming flat, it is prudent to move on.
  3. If the company is fairly treating one in terms of benefits and compensation vis-a-vis new managers hired from outside with similar experience and expertise, one should stay on. In other words, if company undermines one's market worth, one may consider a change.
  4. The moment one feels that one is entering a comfort zone, it's time either to reconfigure the present role within the company or to look for new job.
  5. For a manager who has a desire to be known as a generalist rather than a specialist, it is prudent to change industry at regular intervals to get a hang of how things move in various industries.
  6. Lastly, one should be aware of one's inner feeling towards the current work in a company. If one is loving one's work, enjoying it, and finding it invigorating, it makes sense to stick to it.

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