{"id":7044,"date":"2025-07-08T21:37:20","date_gmt":"2025-07-08T21:37:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/aomtodayprod.wpenginepowered.com\/?p=7044"},"modified":"2025-07-09T15:35:20","modified_gmt":"2025-07-09T15:35:20","slug":"managers-and-top-performers-need-better-communication-about-career-paths","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.aom.org\/today\/managers-and-top-performers-need-better-communication-about-career-paths\/","title":{"rendered":"Managers and Top Performers Need Better Communication about Career Paths"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Jason Collins<\/a><\/p>\n

More young workers are prioritizing scheduling flexibility and work-life balance, and finding traditional managerial career paths less appealing. Even when they\u2019re offered a promotion to a management role, some talented young professionals are choosing to remain individual contributors rather than take on the stress of managing people.<\/p>\n

Academy of Management Scholar Carol Kulik<\/a> of the University of South Australia said, based on this growing trend, she recommends that management rethink how they motivate and retain employees. Kulik said in previous years, companies \u201cheld onto people by promoting them and giving them more and more responsibility.\u201d<\/p>\n

However, in some cases, this is no longer effective, and it could drive away top performers who prefer to deepen their specialized skills. Even if they stay, there\u2019s a risk of moving talented employees off a role that maximizes their job satisfaction and productivity.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs these people who are strong individual contributors become more and more untethered, are we just creating a gig economy?\u201d Kulik said.<\/p>\n

Not all high performers have the same aspirations for their career paths. Kulik explains that one employee might welcome the opportunity to climb the ladder by taking on a management role, while another might prefer to expand their current role by taking on more responsibilities without managing others. Kulik cited the risk to both employer and employee when there\u2019s a disconnect or miscommunication about the individual\u2019s planned or desired career path.<\/p>\n

Kulik explained that this misalignment of employee aspirations and employer assumptions is happening because management is clinging to outdated career models rather than building meaningful growth paths for individual contributors.<\/p>\n

\u201cHistorically, organizations have not done a good job with individual contributors because they don\u2019t develop career ladders that are long enough for employees to feel that they\u2019re getting the same kind of benefits or are valued as much as employees on the managerial ladder,\u201d Kulik said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf they don\u2019t feel valued or don\u2019t see attractive opportunities for professional growth, individual contributors lose connections to organizations,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Companies can honor individual contributors by asking about their preferences and offering flexible career-growth opportunities that incorporate each person\u2019s professional aspirations.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Jason Collins More young workers are prioritizing scheduling flexibility and work-life balance, and finding traditional managerial career paths less appealing. Even when they\u2019re offered a promotion to a management role, some talented young professionals are choosing to remain individual contributors rather than take on the stress of managing people. Academy of Management Scholar Carol […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13,"featured_media":7046,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[20,19,44,76],"tags":[],"sp_smart_badges":[],"ppma_author":[841],"class_list":["post-7044","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-careers","category-leadership","category-motivation","category-performance"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nManagers and Top Performers Need Better Communication about Career Paths - Academy of Management Today<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.aom.org\/today\/managers-and-top-performers-need-better-communication-about-career-paths\/\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Jason Collins\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\\\/\\\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.aom.org\\\/today\\\/managers-and-top-performers-need-better-communication-about-career-paths\\\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.aom.org\\\/today\\\/managers-and-top-performers-need-better-communication-about-career-paths\\\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Jason Collins\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.aom.org\\\/today\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/9552e9718df5b29713d7c49aea25a029\"},\"headline\":\"Managers and Top Performers Need Better Communication about Career Paths\",\"datePublished\":\"2025-07-08T21:37:20+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2025-07-09T15:35:20+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.aom.org\\\/today\\\/managers-and-top-performers-need-better-communication-about-career-paths\\\/\"},\"wordCount\":372,\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.aom.org\\\/today\\\/managers-and-top-performers-need-better-communication-about-career-paths\\\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.aom.org\\\/today\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2025\\\/06\\\/e615dd96-f514-465a-96bf-4ffe36ba186f.jpg\",\"articleSection\":[\"CAREERS\",\"LEADERSHIP\",\"MOTIVATION\",\"PERFORMANCE\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.aom.org\\\/today\\\/managers-and-top-performers-need-better-communication-about-career-paths\\\/\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.aom.org\\\/today\\\/managers-and-top-performers-need-better-communication-about-career-paths\\\/\",\"name\":\"Managers and Top Performers Need Better Communication about Career Paths - 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Even when they\u2019re offered a promotion to a management role, some talented young professionals are choosing to remain individual contributors rather than take on the stress of managing people. Academy of Management Scholar Carol…","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.aom.org\/today\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7044","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.aom.org\/today\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.aom.org\/today\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.aom.org\/today\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/13"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.aom.org\/today\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7044"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.aom.org\/today\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7044\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.aom.org\/today\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7046"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.aom.org\/today\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7044"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.aom.org\/today\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7044"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.aom.org\/today\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7044"},{"taxonomy":"sp_smart_badges","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.aom.org\/today\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/sp_smart_badges?post=7044"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.aom.org\/today\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/ppma_author?post=7044"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}