Developing Leaders Key to Succession Planning: Deliberate strategies prepare employees and organizations

It’s not unusual in the public sector for leaders within an organization to be passionate about their organizations and their organizations’ success. While people in these positions are focused on current objectives, it’s important to consider how they are supporting the organization’s future success. Succession planning for key positions outside senior leadership is essential.

Maintaining the best employees and developing their skills and careers are mutually beneficial to employees and the organization. In addition, employee turnover is an expensive and time-consuming challenge. While approximately one in four U.S. worker quits each year, almost three quarters of that turnover might have been prevented. (hr.nih.gov) But there are strategies that support individuals as well as organizational success through succession planning that can broaden employees’ skills and strengthen their opportunities to move into roles with more responsibility.

While it’s common for organizations to execute succession planning for leadership roles, it’s important to examine which roles throughout the organization are most at-risk for losing critical organizational knowledge or skills. Before defining succession plans based on existing employees’ skills, its advantageous to determine what skills are necessary, and identify other positions in the organization that could provide relevant experience to prepare the potential successor.  From this point, organizations can provide skill-building opportunities so employees are ready for their next role.

The first step is to determine which roles have a significant impact on the organization and would benefit from a succession plan.  Identifying the requirements for these position enables the organization to determine detailed selection criteria. From here, it should be possible to identify existing roles that either support or complement the position and encompass the knowledge, skills and abilities to make an easy transition, whether it’s temporary while a search is completed, or permanent.

Meeting with fellow managers to gather suggestions on any modifications that the position might need allows the opportunity to update responsibilities before determining the succession plan. Once the job description is final, this same group of colleagues could be included in identifying potential internal succession candidates for a transition position when the job becomes available.

In addition to these candidates, there may be other current employees with skills that align with the job description. It’s important to provide an avenue for these employees to express interest in a potential promotion so that all employees see that the process is transparent

At this point it’s possible to evaluate if a position is not aligned with obvious successors and determine if there is someone in-house who may be a good fit with additional training. Working with your team to develop the position’s requirements allows you to gather information on the role from every perspective. While soliciting feedback is important, it’s equally important to be clear that potential in-house candidates are not entitled to the role.

If there is not an obvious internal fit, it may be time to plan the search for that candidate. At this point you will be prepared with an updated job description and a clear understanding of what the role is and the necessary skills required. In addition, moving forward you can incorporate this process across your organization to help identify ways to support employee’s growth potential and future opportunities.

Developing a succession plan for critical positions may seem unusual within your organization, but the structure of the process is helpful in clearly defining roles and critical skills. Taking the time to do this planning before positions become available means you will be ready when the need arises, and be able to fill the position – potentially internally – quickly and efficiently.