Succession Planning: Making Your Plan for Retaining KnowledgeOctober 19th, 2007 |
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BusinessWeek’s Managing IQ blog always has interesting posts on how to “manage smarter”. A recent post The Coming Brain Drain talks about the fear that in a matter of a few years, there’s going to be no one left with any real experience in corporate North America. It cites a study from Monster that has a number of statistics on knowledge retention - all of which drive home the increasing urgency for succession planning starting today.
One of the most telling findings from the study is that only 12 percent of human resource managers report knowledge retention as a high priority within their organizations, despite the fact that one-third estimate 20 percent or more of their current workforce will be eligible for retirement over the next several years.
Sounds scary, but what does this really mean? It tells me that succession planning isn’t really being done by enough organizations. And that companies really need to get it on the agenda now so they can plan for the future, and have adequate time to teach and mentor workers so that knowledge is passed on.
The talent-pool driven model to succession planning enables organizations to build a pool of “promoteable” employees - that is employees that have the necessary knowledge and skills to enable companies to remain competitive. Without a solid and sustainable approach to succession planning today, which includes knowledge retention, companies will be left behind once workers retire.
The good news is that succession planning doesn’t have to be complicated or scary. By tightly integrating it into the employee performance and talent management process, it can be done simply and easily on a day-to-day basis so organizations are ready for the future.
Tags: employee performance management, HR, succession planning, talent managementRelated posts
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