Interdisciplinary Approach to Sustainable Employee Development

Abstract Purpose The main cognitive goal of this paper is to examine which benefits and gains achieved by the employees are the best indicators of the sustainability of their development. The concept of research and the structure of the paper is based on the following steps: (A) conceptual analysis of the sustainability of employee development; (B) formulation of a new, interdisciplinary and multidimensional approach to the concept of sustainable development of employees; (C) empirical-research-based analysis indicating factors determining the effects of mentoring processes juxtaposed with identified dimensions of sustainable employee development. Design/methodology/approach The following research questions have been formulated: RQ1: What is the structure of interdependencies between various mentoring effects describing employee development?; RQ2: Which of the different mentoring effects contribute to the specific dimensions of sustainable employee development? The Social Network Analysis study was carried out using traditional methods, i.e., by modelling the analyzed phenomenon using graphs, processed by the most up-to-date version of the Social Network Visualizer software. Findings We analyze which aspects of employees' development within the mentoring process are crucial for the sustainability of the process. We obtain these results by conducting a network analysis of a range of parameters commonly used to measure employee development, as well as aspects of mentoring processes. We have formulated a new, interdisciplinary, and multidimensional proposal for defining employee sustainability, which is the main conceptual result of the study. It allows for a holistic approach to employee sustainability within the organization's operations. Empirical analysis confirmed the multidimensionality of the mentoring process. The three groups of factors distinguished in the graph model M1 (I, II, III) correspond to the criteria distinguished in the proposed definition of sustainability of the employee development process. Practical implications The intention behind this study was to explore the interdisciplinarity and multidimensionality of employee development sustainability, aiming to achieve a holistic theoretical approach that could be translated into specific, practical development goals for the organization. The development of an employee can be perceived in the broader context as sustainable employee development. There are four dimensions of such development that can be taken into consideration by employers: organizational, ethical, sociological, and psychological. Originality/value We propose an innovative research methodology for the perception of sustainable development among employees using Social Network Analysis (SNA).