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Considerations and Questions for Strategic Planning
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There are a number of strategic considerations any leader needs to make when thinking about succession planning. Do you have clear answers to the following questions?
- Why do you need succession planning in your company?
- How well do you understand succession planning?
- Do you have a general policy about succession planning?
- Can you identify how succession planning will benefit your organization?
- How does succession planning fit in relation to your overall workforce planning, talent management and leadership development?
If not, you have some work to do! Let's get started:
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Take The Mystery Out Of Succession Planning
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Think about how often a key person leaves and the organization is surprised—and has no one who can step in. Or there’s an opportunity for the business to grow, but no one has the skill set to make it happen. These situations only get worse when there is a war for talent. A solid succession planning process increases the likelihood that the organization has the individuals with the right skills and motivation when the business needs them.
The basic steps of succession planning are the same regardless of organizational size. Larger organizations have complex approaches because of their scale—not because the fundamentals are different.
When developing a succession planning model, you first must be sure to understand the market forces and strategies that set the path of the organization, so you have a strategic guide for context and direction. As famous baseball coach Yogi Berra wryly noted, “If you don’t know where you are going, you will probably end up somewhere else.”
The magic of succession planning happens during a series of senior leader structured conversations that must answer questions about what the business needs and how to get the most from individuals. To do this, senior leader discussions should integrate three perspectives to create a succession plan: the organizational needs, an understanding about key individuals, and the developmental processes needed to ready the individuals for future roles or to solve critical organizational issues. Make sure you talk to your identified succession planned employees - they need to know your plan and how important they are to the future of the company. This is also huge for employee retention!
ORGANIZATIONAL NEEDS
Organizational needs vary—for example, the growth of the millennial workforce and their expectations, an aging senior management team that will retire in the next few years, or changes in market competition that require innovative approaches to the business. Identification of these types of issues will drive the developmental plans to ensure the right talent will be available and create the solutions necessary for success.
INDIVIDUAL NEEDS
This part of the discussion examines individuals’ strengths and developmental needs, their personal issues, their performance, sources of motivation, and career aspirations. After understanding the individuals, a gap analysis will help bring these first two steps together—to identify how the current talent pool matches up with the organizational needs.
DEVELOPMENTAL PROCESSES
The third segment of the succession planning conversation uses all the approaches and tools for talent development. This is when you’ll create an action plan to close your talent gaps. The action plan allows senior line managers to identify:
- The specific issues driving the need for talent in the business—and the implications in regard to the strengths and weaknesses of the internal workforce.
- Who will fill what job(s)? There should be a list of “ready now” candidates for each important position, and an understanding of any concerns that might have an impact on the plan.
- Who are the “up and comers,” what are their motivators and career interests, and where does the organization need them? What developmental plans are necessary to get them ready? Are they interested and willing to fill the position?
Succession planning needs to be an ongoing set of conversations that provide managers with the critical information and resources to engage employees and ensure the business has the talent ready to support successful future business performance.
Article Author: Ross Tartell, Ph.D., Adjunct Professor,
Psychology and Education, Columbia University
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The Future is Now: Succession Planning 101
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Succession planning and management involves an integrated, systematic approach to identifying, developing and retaining employees in line with current and projected business objectives. However, very early in the design process we recommend that organizations identify a common set of leadership attributes required in their workplace of tomorrow. These leadership attributes underlie the entire succession planning process, inform leaders what they need to know and do, and pinpoint what kinds of employees the organization needs to succeed.
While your business will identify attributes relevant to your own culture, some examples include:
- Think from the outside in
- Drive innovation and growth
- Develop, teach and engage others
- Lead with energy, passion, and urgency so that teams can respond quickly to innovation
- Demonstrate our corporate values of integrity, honesty, and professional ethics
Incorporating time to honestly and thoughtfully articulate leadership attributes will serve as a touchstone for the rest of the process and act as a guide in assessing your potential candidates.
Similarly, regardless of the size of your organization there are key elements we recommend that are critical for effective succession planning. Developing a robust process requires any business to:
- Secure senior level support for the process: Success won’t happen without top management endorsement and support.
- Align succession management within overall business strategy: Line executives are much more likely to support a system that clearly reinforces corporate goals and objectives.
- Keep the process simple: Logical, efficient processes avoid burdensome bureaucracy.
- Engage technology to support the process: Information technology allows managers to monitor and update development needs in a timely manner.
- Undertake a top-down review: Determine the capabilities, roles, and talent needed to execute your business strategy today and in the future.
- Gauge your team’s bench strength: Ask the critical question “Do we have who we need – now and in the future – and if not, how do we get there?”
- Create individualized development plans: Don’t apply a cookie-cutter approach to professional development but instead offer an assortment of opportunities such as leadership workshops, on-the-job learning, special projects, external classes or individual assignments.
- Acknowledge your employees: Let people know they are valued contributors, they ar the future of the company and provide them opportunities for development, exposure to senior leaders, and networking across divisions.
- Focus on retention and engagement: Incorporate rewards and recognition, a positive work environment, job autonomy, broadened scope of responsibilities, and promotion where earned.
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