Mentoring for Succession:
Countering Aging
Work Force Issues
by Allison McWilliams, of the Carl Vinson Institute of Government,
a public service and outreach unit of the University of Georgia.
Originally presented at the 2005 Oakland, California IMA Conference
As a land-grant institution, the University of Georgia has a three-fold mission
of teaching, research, and service. The Vinson Institute at which I work, fulfills
part of that third mission though public policy research, training and development,
technical assistance, economic and community development, and international development.
While employed by the Vinson Institute I helped to develop, administer and deliver
leadership development programs for state and local government entities, such as
the Office of Child Support Enforcement, the Department of Family and Children Services,
the Department of Transportation, the Department of Natural Resources, and others.
While these programs were well-planned and well-executed, they did not necessarily
address any identified need of the organization, other than a general sense that
developing leaders is a good thing. And certainly, there are many "soft skills" leadership books available to prove it. Our clients were happy with the services
they were receiving, and frankly we felt good about the services we were delivering.
But about two and a half to three years ago, we noticed something altogether different
happening within organizations. People were beginning to leave. And not just a
few here and there, but all over the place, in government, in corporations, in non-profits,
and, not surprisingly, in higher education as well.
Why? The Baby Boomers are retiring in droves. And with their departure comes vast
chasms of leadership and management talent, despite all of the "soft skills" books and classes consumed over the past 10-15 years. And it's not because those
books and classes aren't adequate; many of them are quite good. It is that they are
not specific to the needs of a particular organization, even down to the needs of
a particular position. And that is precisely what succession planning attempts to
address.
Having identified this need, we set out to learn all that we could about the field
in order to provide it as a service to our clients, many of whom were shocked to
discover, once they took an in-depth look at the figures, just how many people could
walk out of their doors in the next 12-18 months. As part of our research, we attended
conferences, read books, and benchmarked other organizations for best practices.
Then, about a year and a half ago, I was approached by the Vice President for
public service and outreach at UGA, who wanted to know if we knew anything about
succession planning, because the university is also filled with baby boomers who
can't wait to retire. Even more so as they discover that with ongoing budget cuts
and no hope of raises anytime soon, financially speaking, at least, retirement is
the better option to working.
A year and a half later, we are proud of the steps that we have taken. We are moving
towards a day of culture change, a day when improving ourselves, thereby improving
the organization, becomes the way we do business.
Succession planning is not, and can not be a one-time activity. It is an ongoing
process, an ongoing examination of what the organization should stop, should start,
and should continue.
Additionally, every year for the next three decades, there will be fewer young
people entering the job market than there are workers leaving.
A version of this "heir apparent" model, has been found for years in
many corporations. The company head picks his or her successor - usually someone
very much like himself or herself - and grooms that person to one day run the company.
On down the line there may be similarly selected successors, so that on a company
flow chart every position of importance will have a name attached to it, an identified
future replacement. There is never any doubt about who will be replacing whom.
There are several potential problems with this model:
What do you do when you make a huge investment of time and money in someone and
they decide to leave?
What incentive is there for everyone else to develop and achieve when they know from
the start that they have no chance of moving up?
Succession planning models exist on a continuum, with the heir apparent model
on one end of that continuum, on the other is the idea of development for all.
In the "development for all" model, everyone is developed equally, and
everyone has an equal shot at the top slot. No one is given preferential treatment,
or singled out for higher levels of development.
However, this approach is only an ideal.
The reality of organizational structures is that there is only one slot at the
top, and not everyone can or should fill it. In fact, as Marcus Buckingham and Curt
Coffman point out in their book, "First Break All the Rules", a "career
ladder" approach that rewards movement toward the top, sets up people to fail.
This is so because when we tell people that success is measured by how far up that
ladder they move, inevitably, most of our people will not succeed.
Additionally, "too many chiefs and not enough Indians" is a big problem.
For example, the goal of a university would never be to move everyone up a career
path into some level of administration, because who will be left to teach the courses?
Take care of the grounds? Clean the buildings?
A way is needed to reward people at their current organizational level, as well
as those who are interested in moving up.
The best approach is somewhere in between and is a combination of the "heir
apparent" and the "development for all" models. This hybrid model
is known as "developing bench strength". Instead of a one-for-one replacement
plan, there are several people prepared to step into any vacant position at any time.
One of the best examples of this model is General Electric. When Jack Whelch was
ready to retire, he had three people developed to take over for him. Eventually,
one went to 3M, one went to Home Depot, and one was chosen to take over at GE. Talk
about bench strength! And, both the organization and the people were winners!
This worked because succession planning was specific to the needs of the organization.
Such planning starts by taking a strategic look at your needs now and in the future,
and taking steps to address those needs. It is taking a proactive stance towards
your organization's success, today and tomorrow.
While most of these principles are dicussed in detail later in the article, I am presenting them here as well to frame our discussion of this topic.
A suggested model follows in the next section.
Rothwell, William J. Effective Succession Planning, 2nd ed. NY; AMACOM, 2001.
P. 75-76.
Conversations during a process like that which is listed above often become awkward when terms that some people use have different or no meanings for others. Below are three such terms and my suggested definitions. Whether you use these of develop your own, evryone in your organization should use the same definitions.
High Potentials: these are the folks who have the potential to move up the career ladder in 6 months, in one year, in three years, in five years, whatever YOU determine to be an adequate time frame for your organization.
Competencies: these are both future and present. What are the things our people need if they and this organization are to succeed? What will they need in the future? What are we going to measure their progress against?
Competencies are sometimes called KSAs: the Knowledge, Skills and Abilities required to do the job. Examples of competencies include interpersonal skills, knowledge of budgeting/accounting, oral communication skills, written communication skills, decision making ability, and others. It is crucial that these be the things which YOUR employees need. Make it specific to the organization, to the unit, to the job, and to the individual.
Employee Improvement Plan, also known as a workforce development plan or an individual development plan: this is a means for the INDIVIDUAL to document and track his/her own progress. Such a plan also provides guidance for personal development activities. The key here is that it is not an evaluation, nor is it about punishment. It is about progress, and development.
Succession planning at a university, especially at a large research institution
such as the University of Georgia, can be touchy. On one hand, universities act like
large corporations, employing thousands of people, working to satisfy multiple stakeholders,
and making real economic impact on the surrounding community. The levels of bureaucracy
are, at times, mind-blowing. Just trying to get something simple done, like getting
travel reimbursed, can be an arduous process.
On the other hand, universities are still very much like "mom and pop"
operations. Often the principal players have been in place for decades, running things
the way they see fit. They serve as supreme ruler over their own personal kingdom,
acting pretty much with autonomy, and occasionally waging war with rival kingdoms.
The push for change and for progress can be a slow one, and it often comes up against
arguments like, "We don't fix what ain't broke," and, "We've always
done it this way."
Every college and university is currently experiencing a tension between these two
elements:
1. the corporate, "entrepreneurial" university, and
2. the historic notion of the ivory tower and more of an autonomous organization.
There are two reasons for considering this situation.
First is to reinforce the idea that no one model of succession planning will
work in a university environment. If we use the heir apparent mode there are legal
issues that arise from concerns about singled out some as being "better"
or "more capable" than others, or as "rising stars". For that
reason most organizations will use the "development for all" model and
pretend that everyone is on the same level, and that everyone has an equal chance
to get to the top slot.
As crucial as it is to develop everyone within an organization, we must also deal
with political realities. In some organizations, there will be no planning for succession
of the president, the vice presidents, and even in some cases, a level below that.
Those will be political appointments.
The second reason for addressing the changing environment of higher education
is that it is key to why you must be constantly scanning your environment, planning
for future needs, and closing those gaps. The move to a more entrepreneurial university,
combined with continual budget cuts, will without a doubt result in more departures
of senior staff. Folks who have spent 30 years in relative obscurity, happy to do
their research, are now being asked to go out and find income, to support themselves.
For many, it just won't be worth it.
Business Week reports that over 35% of employees who are not being mentored within 12 months of being hired, will be actively looking for another job.
To put it simply, mentoring can be the cheapest, easiest, most effective, and most fulfilling means of "closing your gaps" in the succession planning process.
In turn, the young person gains a connection to the institution that extends beyond a paycheck, will learn about the history of the organization, and understand why their job matters. The learning possibilities are:
Every one of us has been influenced by the people we have met, and the wisdom
that they have passed along to us, a wise counselor, a good, ethical, moral person,
an effective leader, teacher or administrator, someone who was your ally, your advocate,
your coach, someone who helped you along the path that you have taken? Someone, indeed,
who was your mentor.
The people who work for us deserve that same opportunity, not a guarantee of promotion,
but the opportunity to become the best version of themselves that they can be. And
the best result of all from using mentoring is that you will end up with a more engaged,
motivated and high performing workplace.
1. Form a program leadership group representing stakeholders. Include those
whom you see as high potentials and put them to work. They will gain and you will
gain.
The advisory committee we formed performs the following functions:
2. Facilitate this group's discussion of the terms succession planning
and leadership development and the other definitions offered in this article. Also
discuss issues and needs that seemed readily apparent and needed addressing right
away.
3. Do some research.
4. Use the information gained from your research to create a brief list of general competency areas for managers who would be the "graduates" of the program.
Our five competencies were:
5. Design one or more program models. We created four potential models
including a self-selection model, mentoring and coaching, a senior executive development
program, and an early career leadership development program.
6. Present the research, conclusions about needs, competencies, and proposed
program(s) to executive level decision makers whose support you must have to succeed.
In our case, the vice president selected three models for further development:
I was also to lead development and implementation of those models. That activity
has occupied the majority of a year.
Here are the steps I took, which seemed to work for our situation
The Advisory Committee was key to all those functions, both because of their assistance
in doing the work, and because this group will help develop future programs too.
We are committed to implementing at a future date our early career development program,
which is more of the "development for all" model,.
MENTOR MATCHING - Participants are being asked to select a mentor, or we will assist them in finding one, for the year-long development program.
MENTOR ROLE - This person is asked to guide the participant through the program, and in particular to address the specific individual development needs of the participant, which is our final competency area. Throughout this process we expect the mentor to be involved in and to monitor the participant's progress.
MENTOR TRAINING - We are providing a formal training session in the beginning of the program, focused primarily on the mentoring process.
MONITORING PROGRESS - The program will be monitoring the mentoring relationship throughout the year, to make sure the participants are truly benefiting from the mentoring relationship.
We plan to implement a stand-alone mentoring program in the near future for those
who can not participate in the Executive Leadership Program.
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