Succession Planning Best Practices - Part I
Bradley Savoy February 20, 2008
One of the most talked about aspects shaping human capital strategies is the impact of the pending retirement of the baby boomer population. Currently holding senior level positions of leadership in many organizations, the boomers departure from the workforce will cause a gap in the management ranks for many companies. In their absence, new executives will be expected to bring a greater understanding of the global business and technology initiatives to the organization. Organizations that wish to be prepared for these impacts will need to embark on a strategic planning and on-going management process to prepare for the eventual replacement of managers at all levels.
Succession planning may be the current buzzword, but it describes just one step of the process – creating the plan. Succession management seeks to denote on-going management of the process, every day, over time. Succession management is the intersection of the human capital function and the business strategy of the organization. Succession management is a process driven through multiple stakeholders to anticipate the future needs of the organization to find, assess, attract, develop, and retain the human capital needed to serve the business strategy.
Multiple factors need to be considered in deployment of a succession management program.
Talent Planning - Performance Measurement: Talent planning is a semi-transparent process in best practice organizations. Managers receive feedback and information about their developmental needs through a 360 degree loop of peers and employees. Also included are suggested activities for further growth. The talent planning process identifies individuals designated as “high potential.” These employees are then placed on a development path to move toward an eventual succession of leadership, across any department or business unit.
Succession management is also heavily tied to performance management. These systems can act as an enable of the talent planning process. Implementation of these systems act as a channel to assess employees based on performance tied to competencies, the organization’s values, and perceived potential.
Leadership Development: A wide range of development programs may be applied for leader engagement. Creation of stretch developmental opportunities is paramount, yet they must remain consistent with the needs of the organization and the individual. Rotational programs are one opportunity to enable inter-departmental learning that can be tied to a future leader’s development.
Technology: Web-based succession management systems have been proven to offer the greatest potential for global access and large-scale data integration. Complexity of the system can vary, but they key is to consider a simple to use system with global access and near real-time updates of data.
Ensuring Success - Monitoring and Assessment: Creation of methods of assessment to monitor the succession planning process varies greatly. Scorecards, metrics dashboards, and inclusion of successor development as part of an executive’s performance plan are considerations.
Posted in Human Resources Analytics, HR Benchmarking, HR Consulting, Human Resources, Recruiting
