In the book “The Alliance: Managing Talent in the Networked Age,” Reid Hoffman, cofounder and chairman of LinkedIn, and co-authors Ben Casnocha and Chris Yeh refer to the different tenures that make up a career as “tours of duty.”
In the context of the alliance, the tour of duty represents an ethical commitment by employer and employee to a specific mission. When he was a manager at LinkedIn, David Hahn (now president and chief product officer at GoFundMe) encouraged his team members to rotate to new tours of duty within LinkedIn so they could gain operational experience across multiple areas.
Kevin Scott, another executive at LinkedIn, takes the concept a step further. He asks every person he manages, “What job do you envision having after you leave LinkedIn?” He even asks that question of people who are interviewing for jobs at LinkedIn. Scott’s aim is to ensure the company can offer a tour of duty that will advance his employees’ future career.
Rich Lesser, the CEO of The Boston Consulting Group, calls this building an “opt-in” culture. “The reality of being an employer is not that you make people feel an obligation to stay,” he told “The Alliance” authors. “You hire the best people you can possibly find. Then it’s up to you to create an environment where great people decide to stay and invest their time.”
