---
id: "action-redesign-roles"
type: "action-item"
source_timestamps: ["§ What Leaders Should Do Differently"]
tags: ["role-design", "capability-building"]
related: ["concept-horizontal-stretch", "framework-midcareer-recalibration"]
action: "Reshape midcareer responsibilities to include cross-functional collaboration, reverse mentoring, and job crafting."
outcome: "Expands employee capabilities and meaning without forcing them out of their current role."
sources: ["tail1"]
sourceVaultSlug: "hbr-seg-tail1"
originDay: 1
articleStem: "hbr-tail-110-midcareer-work-change"
sourceUrl: "https://hbr.org/2026/05/research-as-careers-get-longer-midcareer-work-needs-to-change"
sourceTitle: "Research: As Careers Get Longer, Midcareer Work Needs to Change"
---
# Redesign midcareer roles for horizontal stretch

**Action:** Reshape midcareer responsibilities to include cross-functional collaboration, reverse mentoring, and job crafting.
**Outcome:** Expands employee capabilities and meaning *without* forcing them out of their current role.

**Pillar 2 of [[framework-midcareer-recalibration]].** Instead of treating midcareer roles purely as *execution engines*, leaders should reshape responsibilities to include new challenges that build **adjacent skills**:
- Implement **cross-functional collaboration**,
- Establish **mentoring or reverse-mentoring** relationships, and
- Allow employees to **'craft'** aspects of their daily work to increase meaning.

This provides growth *without* requiring the employee to leave their current role or lose momentum — the practical enactment of [[concept-horizontal-stretch]].

> Related: [[concept-horizontal-stretch]] · [[framework-midcareer-recalibration]]