Succession Planning

Introduction

Among the most important tasks incumbent on Human Resource departments is planning for future trends and challenges. In federal government, succession planning addresses the future leadership structure of an agency. This paper will deal with succession planning in the federal government. It will address why it is important to implement a succession plan as well as how to implement one. This paper was developed after extensive research of succession planning endeavors in the private sector and, more importantly, the federal government. It is intended to build the case that succession planning is invaluable in the development of the workforce in an agency and that without it an agency blindly faces the future.

Background

            Succession planning is the process that facilitates the stability and continuity of personnel in key positions. It can be understood to be an effort focused to ensure the continued effective performance of an organization by making “provision for the development, replacement, and strategic application of key people over time (Rothwell pg.10).” Succession planning occurs when an organization implements a plan to identify, develop, and retain talented individuals. The key positions emphasized in a succession plan include leadership positions and specialized positions that may be technical and difficult to replace.

            Succession planning is premised on the future and does not concern itself solely with immediate needs. This means that succession planning is concerned mostly with the type of managers that will be needed to manage the organization in the future. “A good succession plan will get mangers thinking about what they’ll need in five years, redefining positions and creating a new approach to the work (A Federal Succession Planning Primer pg.1).” Present prerogatives may not always align with the future and as such a distinction needs to be made between succession planning and other types of planning. As such, succession planning is necessarily dynamic. Since the future is unpredictable, the plan must be capable to change and adjust to an environment that may have been initially unforeseen. The importance of succession planning is such that everyone in an organization must be invested in it, not just human resources. This is essential as succession planning is a continuous effort that must be fostered through the life of an organization. It is not simply an academic exercise, it is something that is ever-evolving and requires the attention of key decision makers.

            Succession planning is developed to help meet strategic and operational challenges by placing the right people at the right places at the appropriate time. It is a way to ensure the continual cultivation of leadership talent and to manage the critically important knowledge assets of organizations.  Essentially, succession planning provides a comprehensive inventory of the knowledge, skills, and abilities that will be needed to sustain effective leadership in the future.

Reasons for Succession Planning

            Succession planning is not conducted as a stand-alone exercise without regard to an organization’s strategic plans. Just like competency models complement strategic plans, succession plans are not prepared in a vacuum and are strategically important. This is because individuals are the units that compose a succession plan and it is individuals who advance an organization’s strategic agenda. Strategic planning is a process through which organizations lay out aims for the future. It takes into account present internal organizational strengths and aligns it with future external opportunities. The implementation of a strategic plan requires the right people to be at the right places at the right times. People are the essential component of a strategic plan. On a basic level, succession planning anticipates the talent needs emanating from an organization’s strategy. It gauges the external environment under which the organization’s plan will be implemented and attempts to match it with the internal demands generated by that environment. Succession planning is necessarily linked to strategy especially as technical advancements alter the course of strategy and create the need for people with increasingly specialized skills and with qualifications in disciplines that did not exist before.

            Succession planning is also able to identify “replacement needs” as a means of targeting necessary training, employee education, and development. “Training helps employees meet their current job responsibilities; employee education prepares them to advance to future responsibilities; and employee development can be a tool for individual enlightenment or organizational learning (Rothwell pg.25).” This means that succession planning formalizes and facilitates the process of preparing people to fill key positions in the future. It also provides increased opportunities for “high potential” workers as identifies appropriate ways to accelerate their development and improve their retention.

            Succession planning helps individuals realize their career plans within the organization.  Organizations make an investment in their employees by providing training opportunities. When individuals grow frustrated they leave an organization, taking with them valuable knowledge and experience. It is in the best interest of organizations that employees realize their career plans with the same organization. Succession planning can serve as a tool “by which individuals can be prepared for realizing their career plans within an organization (Rothwell pg.25).” It can help increase employee morale by encouraging promotion from within, thereby increasing retention in the process.

Best Practices and Approaches

            Based on research done on succession planning, these are the acknowledged best practices:

Best Practices According to William Rothwell:

• Deploying a Succession Management Process
  • Best-practice organizations make succession planning an integral corporate process by exhibiting a link between succession planning and overall business strategy. This link gives succession planning the opportunity to affect the corporation’s long-term goals and objectives.

•  Human resources is typically responsible for the tools and processes associated with successful succession planning. Business or line units are generally responsible for the ‘‘deliverables’’—i.e., they use the system to manage their own staffing needs. Together, these two groups produce a comprehensive process.

• Technology plays an essential role in the succession planning process. Ideally, technology serves to facilitate the process (make it shorter, simpler, or more flexible) rather than becoming the focus of the process or inhibiting it in any way.

• Identifying the Talent Pool
  • Best-practice organizations use cyclical, continuous identification process to focus on future leaders.

• Best practice organizations use a core set of leadership and succession management competencies

• Engaging Future Leaders
  • Best-practice organizations emphasize the importance of specific, individualized development plans for each employee.

• Individual development plans identify which developmental activities are needed, and the ‘‘best practice’’ firms typically have a mechanism in place to make it simple for the employee to conduct the developmental activities. Typically, divisional human resource leaders will monitor employee follow-up in developmental activities.

• Best-practice partners rely on the fundamental developmental activities of coaching, training, and development most frequently and utilize all developmental activities to a much greater extent than the sponsor organizations.

• In addition to traditional executive education programs, best-practice partners increasingly use special assignments, action learning, and Web-based development activities.

Of course, an essential best practice is the continual development of succession plans. Like other types of plans, they must be kept current in order to remain relevant and useful. “Succession planning is an ongoing, fluid process that tracks employees as they continue to develop their leadership skills (A Federal Succession Planning Primer Pg.41). Plans should be updated every 6-12 months or if event occurs that requires a reevaluation.

Succession Planning in the Federal Government

            Succession planning has been more formalized in the private sector than in the federal government. However, recently the government has made efforts to introduce succession planning into their planning efforts. This increased focus on succession planning comes at an important time. One study examined the effects of turnover in the federal government’s Senior Executive Service (SES) and noted: “the loss of experienced executives without adequate replacements can have a substantial, immediate negative effect on an organization (Wilkerson pg.3).” Additionally, there as recently been increased competition for talent between the public and private sectors. This has prompted federal agencies to implement strategies found in the private sector to attract and retain talent in this increasingly competitive environment. However, there are challenges facing the federal government that emanate from changing administrations, politics and priorities.

            Succession planning in the federal government, while a worthwhile and necessary endeavor, faces challenges unique to federal government. According to recent surveys, there is increasing distrust and lack of interest among the general population in pursuing a career in government. This lack of interest reduces the pool of capable candidates. There are also barriers to entry at the executive level because government executives are paid much less than their private sector counterparts. “Government regulations make hiring, promotion and firing in the public sector far more difficult than in the private sector, limiting flexibility in succession planning (Wilkerson pg.8).” However, these challenges should not dissuade federal agencies from adopting succession plans. The private sector can offer important lessons and practices such as mentoring, executive rotation, and action learning. These can be implemented by government agencies with relative ease and can ease the development a succession plan even in the context of those challenges.

            For the government, it makes sense to use existing resources to implement succession plans. By making use of the many leadership development programs already in place, the government can nurture senior talent. One way to build skills and develop talent is through job rotation. This is easier to implement at larger federal agencies but giving employees increased and varied responsibility facilitates the succession planning effort. Examples include the Department of Labor’s MBA Fellows program and the Environmental Protection Agency’s Rotational Program.

            A concern specific to the federal government is staff turnover. According to OPM projections, by the end of 2015 more than 50 percent of the 7,745 senior executives in place at the beginning of 2011 will have left government (A Federal Succession Planning Primer pg.1). They will leave a knowledge and experience gap as they take with them key institutional knowledge and critical skills. This should create a sense of urgency to develop succession plans in anticipation of this impending “brain drain.”

Conclusion

Succession planning anticipates future staffing needs and facilitates the identification of talent. It walks managers through the process of predicting when positions may open, evaluates talent they have that can fill positions and develops strategies for training existing staff or recruiting new talent. Not only is it an important tool for departures, but also for retention. Succession planning aids the implementation of strategy by focusing on the entity that will be implementing the strategy, the people. “In the future, the successful agencies and departments will be those that recognize the importance of talent as a performance differentiator (Wilkerson pg.22).” With retirement projections of the next few years slated to increase, it is necessary to bring succession planning to the forefront and remove it from the back-burner. Investment of time and resources in a succession plan now will pay dividends in the future, when the agency won’t be scrambling to fill key leadership positions. 

Works Cited

“The Crisis in Federal Government Succession Planning: What’s Being Done about It.” PwC. N.p., n.d. Web. 26 Sept. 2012. <http://www.pwc.com/us/en/public-sector/publications/federal-government-succession-planning.jhtml&gt;.

“A Federal Succession Planning Primer.” http://www.boozallen.com. Booz Allen Hamilton, June 2011. Web. 26 Sept. 2012. <http://www.boozallen.com/media/file/PPS-PeoplePipeline-2011.pdf&gt;.

Ostrowski, Paul S. “Prerequisites for Effective Succession Planning.” Human Resource Management 7.1 (1968): 10-16. Print.

Rothwell, William J. Effective Succession Planning: Ensuring Leadership Continuity and Building Talent from within. New York: AMACOM, American Management Association, 2005. Print.

Wilkerson, Brian. “Effective Succession Planning for Public.” http://www.4cleanair.org/chicago. Watson Wyatt Worldwide, 2007. Web. 26 Sept. 2012. <http://www.4cleanair.org/chicago/EffectiveSuccessionPlanningforPublic.pdf&gt;.