Succession Plans Suck (Sorta)

You know it’s true. Most succession plans are short-term programs that are poorly conceived and improperly executed. A couple of key candidates are selected as heirs to the throne for the Company’s top management spots.

Thrones, much like succession plans, are overrated.

Most companies plan for the departure of the CEO, president, or even some vice-president. Unfortunately, average companies are so disconnected from daily operations that they overlook critical roles in other departments.

• What about the brand manager who’s been around forever and knows your products inside out?
• What about the customer service representative with a special relationship with your key clients?
• What about the HR manager who knows all the employment laws, has excellent rapport with all your managers and helps them navigate sticky problems?

As far as I’m concerned, most companies miss an opportunity to build a talent pipeline and focus on succession planning in a more holistic manner. If you look at the bigger picture, and consider your succession planning efforts as part of your larger talent management programs, then you should really be looking at developing and grooming employees in all areas of the business to take on a larger or more responsible role.

Even the overpaid analysts and HR consulting firms agree with me. CedarCrestone just released a report 2008-2009 HR Systems Survey. In short, succession planning, when it focuses on executives only, really sucks and costs the organization (& its shareholders) too much money:

The most interesting finding in 2008 is the lower sales growth (statistically significant) of organizations with succession planning. Digging deeper into what might be happening we see that the scope of succession planning matters. When succession planning scope is limited to top management, those organizations in our pool experienced the lowest sales growth, but those with a scope that includes middle managers and even all employees had significantly higher sales growth.

Heather McCulligh is a blogger on the Halogen Software site. She wrote that succession planning should focus on developing people rather than merely naming them as replacements. She points out that succession planning can be a relatively painless process when integrated with talent management.

Obviously, Heather is onto something basic and simple. One of the best ways to identify candidates is to use data that comes from your talent management process, which should be integrated with your employee performance appraisals. People with high potential should be identified early. If you target these employees for further development and groom them to advance in your company, you’ll be investing your shareholder’s dollars in a more thoughtful and fiscally responsible manner.

Succession planning, as a stand-alone endeavor, always fails. When integrated into your culture and merged into your daily operations, succession planning has a chance to build the talent infrastructure of your company.

This is not rocket science, yo.

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