The most constant thing about work is change, and no one is immune from it. Therefore, to maintain the continuity and growth of your business and your organization. It is necessary to be prepared and ready to deal with future challenges and changes. You know that an essential part of being prepared for change is knowing who will lead your organization to the next generation. So you need to prepare a succession planning that enables you to identify, direct and develop your employees with high potential for career growth opportunities. In contrast, senior leadership roles should be a significant focus of a succession strategy that should involve all levels of your organization.
Why do you want a succession planning in your organization?
For the survival and continuity of your activity and business and to maintain your presence in the business world. You must prepare current and future leaders for their job roles that align with the organization’s goals. Furthermore, it is not only your business and product markets that fuel your organization’s success. But also employees who provide exceptional service and generate new ideas. Because distinguished leaders make a tangible difference, please bring your organization’s future stability and make it ready for change and growth.
succession planning
Succession planning is a systematic process to discover future employees who can assume leadership positions as an alternative to current leaders if they leave the organization due to retirement, resignation, termination, promotion, or even death. This process is the evaluation of individuals to pass the leadership role within the organization. And this process ensures that the organization’s activity continues efficiently.
A good succession planning must be an integral part of your organization’s strategy. You note that succession is an essential part of human resource plans. Which is concerned with analyzing jobs that may become vacant in the future. It is also interested in studying the areas of work and clarifying the requirements of the job and the skills of its potential occupant. From here, you have to make sure that your organization is ready by having the right people in place. You should also identify the key leadership positions for your organization and find two or three options for succession for those roles.
As you prepare your succession planning, and to achieve its objective, you should avoid some of the following:
1. Follow intuition and ignore data
Your life experiences help shape your attitudes and beliefs and influence your decisions. Because there is an association between your unconscious thoughts and behavior, and thus actions and decisions affect activity.
Let’s imagine that you have two highly qualified candidates for an executive leadership position in your organization. All things relatively equal, you can choose who graduated from the same university based on your inclinations, your love for your university, and your pride and confidence in its graduates without reviewing their respective data.
What if you remove the names, name them Candidate A and Candidate B. And allow a specialized administrative committee to review relevant details and data such as:
- Performance scores
- Hold a supervisory or leadership position
- Number of completed projects
- Post survey results
- Voluntary shifts
- Number of people promoted in their departments
Will the candidate applying from your university still get the position? The suitable candidate is not always the one you have chosen based solely on your discretion.
2. Focus on past performance without looking at potential
Most organizations have a formal routine process for measuring employee performance. Which typically focuses on results and competencies and reflects the organization’s core values. However, performance is not the only determining factor. When defining future leaders, as a leader, consider potential as a critical component of long-term success.
Look at your employees and ask yourself: What is the candidate’s ability to work on an increasingly large scale and complexity as business needs change? Then help them get to that level by assigning them tasks outside of their current responsibilities. Also, train them and provide them with a mentor who can help direct their efforts.
3. Considering that succession planning is for higher management levels only.
One of the misconceptions regarding succession planning is the belief that it applies only to jobs at higher levels of management. To avoid issues with succession planning, you should identify candidates for critical positions at all levels of the organization. As this makes your strategy more robust and comprehensive.
Monitor your team and see who participates and takes on project tasks outside of their responsibility. An employee with a keen interest gives you a head start in finding future leaders who will help navigate your organization through change. But you have to remember that excellent performance and driving are two different things. Achievement should not be confused with leadership. For example, a team member is performing well, so you promote him to a supervisor or manager position, but that doesn’t necessarily mean he’s capable of leadership.
A leadership role is very different from a job judged solely on your performance. Leadership is about empowering others to make decisions and take ownership.
4. Adopt only one approach and not another
As your organization begins to grow, things can change quickly. New products come into play and add new employees, and additional levels of leadership are needed to help ensure to achieve goals. Since change is a constant, it is safe and reasonable to say that what your business has achieved at this point is not likely to take you to the next.
You can’t plan action just once and say it works for all times and places. As businesses change, your employees will move in and out of your organization, which can be very dangerous for your business. From here, you must realize that business goals change. So you should develop your succession plan. A great way to track change is to conduct a quarterly Business Landscape Survey. It helps identify what is happening in your industry and relate your employees’ competencies to deal with these changes.
It is never too early to make sure that you are ready to deliver long-term success. Ask yourself:
- What is your talk in your field of work?
- How do your competitors innovate?
- What are the market requirements?
- Is your organization ready?
- Do you have the right leaders for the future?
5. Stop development where leadership roles begin.
Another challenge is that training and development slow once individuals move into a leadership role. Having business leaders on the front lines is essential in daily operations and activities, and it also provides supervision and direction to other team members simultaneously. However, if this is the first promotion, these new leaders are usually inexperienced in the skills required for management and leadership.
Self-awareness is an essential skill to develop when taking on a leadership role. This skill is a component of emotional intelligence because as the cultures of organizations change, there is more emphasis on these characteristics.
When we don’t fully develop leaders – including their emotional intelligence – we lose our footprint in defining its culture. For example, if servant leadership is one of your organization’s values, your employees should see this behavior in action. If you expect trust from them, you have to give to receive it.
What your team leaders do when they think no one is watching determines their leadership advantage because someone is always watching.
6. Consider every failure a negative
It requires you to take risks when running your business because appropriate risks fuel business growth. Failure is also an opportunity to start with more information and experience.
Some of the best candidates for leadership are those with a track record of taking risks, correcting quickly, and learning from failure. Great leaders can handle crises and motivate others to see the value of learning from failure. Hence, high ability and efficiency come with great responsibility, and those in authority in your organization have the responsibility to anticipate the organization’s future needs.
If you make succession planning a regular part of your job, it will be easier to deal with future changes and challenges. After all, it is the people who produce or provide the service, and they are the people who make your future vision a reality.
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