RPO and Talent Management Blog by Ochre House | Ochre Talk

Are organisations leaving future talent out of succession planning?

We’ve been hearing a lot about succession planning lately and it’s something which our clients are really focusing on at the moment. In order to help better understand the current issues and queries on this subject, Ochre House held a recent webinar on the topic of ‘Succession Planning and your External Talent Pool’.

In this webinar a group of expert panellists, including the HR Transformation Director at thomsonlocal.com, presented their recommendations on the value of, and how best to implement, talent succession planning to maximise your external talent pool. This interactive webinar involved delegates in a number of polls, allowing the panel to discuss the current talent management situation and issues, and it was the results of these polls which really interested me.

It became clear that the vast majority of companies cannot confidently identify a credible talent pool of leaders or successors for key positions, despite the fact that this issue has been one of the business priorities since the recession hit.

It is worrying that during the webinar, 76% of delegates involved admitted they were not able to confidently identify the next three leaders or successors for any key positions internally or externally. What this really shows is a need for companies to do much more to align their career management strategies to successful talent development. Business critical roles are seen as the obvious group to focus succession planning initiatives for, but it was widely agreed during the webinar that talent succession across all levels is ideal and organisations ignore ‘future talent’ at their own peril when the ‘War for Talent’ returns.

The solution to this is a strategic talent succession plan which is fully incorporated into all business strategies. Given the dynamic between retaining high performers and the lack of identified talent for business critical roles, this gap needs to be bridged. If organisations use talent mapping tools to build a robust talent succession strategy, they will be able to increase retention levels and reduce risk. Now ask yourself, does your organisation have an effective succession plan? Please post your thoughts and add to the conversation.

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