The corporate resources and personal energy devoted to developing and retaining current and future leaders in an organisation are massive. The loss of resources and capability due to career failures, attrition and churn can be huge. Lost talent and competitiveness are not easily replaced. That these losses might be due simply to not enabling valuable individuals to make transitions is something which no one – management, employees or shareholders – wants or should allow to happen.
Transitions
Transitions are common in all aspects of work and life. They can be large or small, to similar situations or widely divergent ones. In work they take place in a multitude of ways such as through promotion, lateral moves, on-boarding, and recuitment. The ability to successfully navigate repeated transitions within one’s field or into completely different domains is crucial for continued evolution in one’s career and in life.
Expertise
Expertise is the combination of experience, knowledge and processes that enable an individual to perform at the top of their domain or field. Expertise exists in all domains from playing the piano, to designing an automobile, to playing football, to gardening, to cooking.
Transition Expertise
Transition Expertise is the set of skills, knowledge and abilities that enable one to make repeated successful moves throughout one’s life and career. It is not synonymous with the skills required for a specific position. Rather it consists of the abilities to navigate from one familiar position through unknown territory to another, often completely different, situation. These transitions themselves are anything but stable or predictable. They require a special combination of abilities and skills.