For Team Members: Navigating skill alignment conversations
Gain clarity on your strengths, align your goals and shape your next career step
Steps to follow:
1. Get started by navigating to the 'Skills' menu on the Greenbeam platform.
2. Click on 'Occupation skills alignment' to view an assessment summary.
Note: This view will be available once both the self and manager assessments have been completed.
3. The first section of the alignment page shows skills that still need to be aligned.
4. Skills with a grey tab highlight skills that are waiting to be finalised by your manager.
5. 'Possible upskilling opportunities':
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These highlight skills where assessment ratings differ.
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These are prompts for a conversation to build a shared understanding of what the skill really means and how it shows up in your day-to-day work.
6. Click on the skill to see a summary of your selected level and your managers selected level.
Mindset check: There are many reasons why you and your manager may have selected different levels. For example, a difference in how the skill is understood, or simply because they may not have had the opportunity to see you demonstrate it (or all aspects of it).
That’s why it’s important to approach these conversations with curiosity and a growth mindset. They’re an opportunity to build shared understanding and support your development.
7. Click on the Skill Journal where you can view shared notes between you and your manager before, during, and after an alignment conversation.
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Your manager might leave notes for you to help you prepare for your alignment conversation in advance.
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This is also a great place to capture examples of how you’re already demonstrating the skill, or how you plan to build it to the next level.
Remember: Recording notes from your conversations here also helps you keep track of what was discussed, making it easier to build a meaningful development plan when the time comes.
8. Click to share your notes.
Next, let's look at what happens once your manager marks a skill as aligned.
9. The 'Aligned skill levels' section indicates areas that are agreed and confirmed to be aligned with both team member and manager.
(You must have completed at least one skill alignment conversation with your manager to be able to see this section.)
10. Upskilling opportunities identify skills that will be the core focus when building a development plan.
11. The 'skill bar' indicates the distance between the agreed current level and required skill level for the role.
Next let's look at how to start a development plan for this skill.
11. An alignment conversation can end here, with a shared understanding of the level you currently hold. Or you can continue into building a development plan together.
To start creating a development plan for your upskilling opportunities, head to the Development plan tab.
12. All notes captured for this skill during alignment conversations remain available here in the Skill Journal.
You can continue recording notes, reflections, and progress over time so once you’ve completed your upskilling, you can look back and clearly see how far you’ve come.
13. When adding goals to your action plan, use the 70:20:10 rule to consider all the different ways learning can support your development.
14. Not all learning needs to be formal training. Sometimes it’s as simple as your manager observing, supporting, and guiding you in the flow of work.
Don't forget, development goals don't always have to be formal courses or structured training. Always consider the 70:20:10 method.
70% of professional upskilling happens in the flow of normal work - look for those opportunities first!
15. Complete each goal including a description, any relevant links and an expected completion date.
Tip: SMART goals are Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-bound. Keeping these in mind can help turn good intentions into real progress.
16. Update your goals as you progress. This will be shared with your manager.
17. Use your progress on these goals as a prompt to check in regularly with your manager, and capture notes along the way in the Skill Journal.
Once your goals are complete, it’s time to realign and close the gap!
Remember to be intentional with your development plan.
Ask yourself: "Will completing these activities help my manager and me confidently move this skill to the next level?"