Growing Your Company's Leaders: How Great Organizations Use Succession Management to Sustain Competitive / Edition 1

by Robert M. Fulmer, Jay Alden Conger

Overview

"Within the next few years, "baby boomer" leaders and managers will be retiring in huge numbers. From the executive suite on down, the challenge to put the right person in place for every job is becoming acute. The potential shortfall means organizations must put succession planning at the top of their priority lists. Growing Your Company’s Leaders offers the results of a study of five global leaders in succession strategy: Dow Chemical, Dell Computer, Eli Lilly, Pan Canadian Petroleum, and Sonoco. Readers will learn what these and sixteen other high-profile organizations are doing to identify, secure, and prepare the next generation of leaders.

This book examines:

• the link between succession management and business strategy

• the architecture of good plans and how technology can make them better

• the importance of individual employee development

• why senior management support is crucial

• how to monitor the effectiveness of the succession management system."

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780814407677
Publisher:	AMACOM
Publication date:	03/12/2003
Pages:	256
Product dimensions:	6.10(w) x 9.10(h) x 1.10(d)
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Robert M. Fulmer (Santa Barbara, CA) teaches at Pepperdine University and is the academic director of Duke Corporate Education. His books include Leadership by Design and The Leadership Investment (0-8144-0558-4). Jay A. Conger (Manhattan Beach, CA) is Senior Research Scientist at the Center for Effective Organizations at the University of Southern California and teaches at London Business School. He has written or contributed to numerous books, including Corporate Boards .

Table of Contents

"1. Succession Management: The New Imperative

A. Historical Development

B. The Re-Invention of Succession Planning

C. Dynamic New Systems

D. Why the Renewed Interest Today

E. Purposes of Succession Management

F. Underlying Dimensions of a Winning Approach

G. Key Dimensions of an Effective System

H. Summary

2. Building a Successful Succession Management System

A. Who Best to Run

B. Case Examples

C. Communicating the Overall Strategy

D. Always Improving the Process

E. It’s Going Nowhere Without the Boss

F. Technology and Overcoming Georgraphy

G. Below the Executive Level

H. Principles of Systems Design

I. So What Have We Learned Thus Far

3. The People Behind Succession Management

A. The Role of 360 degree Feedback

B. Process for Picking Winners

C. Case Examples

D. Identification Tools

E. Talent Pools

F. Competency Models

G. Best Practice Insights

4. Growing Future Leaders

A. Losing the War For Talent

B. The Voice of the Leader

C. Developing a Developmental Perspective

D. Six Developmental Tools That Work

E. Conclusions

5. Measuring and Assuring Success

A. Qualitative and Quantitative Measures

B. Case Examples

C. Key Criteria

D. Future Goals

E. Key Best Practice Insights

6. The Future of Succession Planning"

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

The Globe and Mail (Toronto): “The book tackles the major issues in getting succession management right, with abundant examples from the best practice companies. . . The result is an easy-to-read, comprehensive picture of where your company should be on succession management."

CIO

If you believe that people are the key to any successful enterprise,then Growing Your Company's Leaders is key reading.
—March 2004

Editorial Reviews

The book tackles the major issues in getting succession management right, with abundant examples from the best practice companies.
. . The result is an easy-to-read, comprehensive picture of where your company should be on succession management.

The Globe and Mail (Toronto)

If you believe that people are the key to any successful enterprise, then Growing Your Company's Leaders is key reading.

CIO

For decades, succession management identified replacements for senior executives who, it was assumed, would eventually depart the organization through death or retirement. In many companies, the planning for succession was simply one of several "annual events," without much thought given that the process could be deployed for development and/or retention of talented employees. These days, good workers are often lured away to competing organizations, and companies without strong succession processes are left hanging. Many top managers move on and must be replaced.

In Growing Your Company's Leaders, Robert M. Fulmer, a teacher at Pepperdine University, and Jay A. Conger, a teacher at London Business School, explore how the competition for talent is changing, and how several best practice companies, including Sonoco, PanCanadian, Eli Lilly, Dell Computer, and Dow Chemical, have used succession management as a source for strategic advantage.

Succession management has been traditionally considered a necessary human resources system in most companies, the authors write, with the purpose of identifying replacements for senior executives who would eventually depart the organization. Few, if any, regarded the practice as being useful for developing or retaining talented individuals in the lower rungs of the organizational hierarchy. It was assumed that top managers were in place for the duration, until an unfortunate circumstance (a health problem, an accident, etc.) removed them from their places.

The authors explain that most companies possessed an essential, but largely unheralded succession management list, identifying an adequate and appropriate pool of replacements, warmed up and ready, should any of the top players in the company leave the field. The authors write that such a model of succession management had several fundamental shortcomings. For one, they explain, it was focused only on the very top positions of the company and, as a result, the names were chosen at the general manager level.

Secondly, they write, it gave top management few options in the search for the next generation of company leaders. Rather than focus on leadership development, the list merely acted as the ladder on which lower-rung executives could climb if they stayed with the organization long enough. As a participant, you were moved methodically after a certain number of years from one step to the next step. So, while you might prove to be a fast learner and a high performer, the authors explain, you still had to stay within the lock step of the career path.

Today, we are witnessing the impact of an emerging new breed of succession systems. Contemporary systems, the authors write, no longer think solely about the replacement of talent. They are also focused on development. These new systems take a more systemic approach toward the organization's talent and strategy, the authors explain, placing more emphasis on the candidate's potential than on recent performance alone.

Where old systems were characterized by complete confidentiality and secrecy, today's systems actually encourage involvement by individuals who are participants and candidates. Under older systems, the authors add, few participants knew where they actually stood in terms of their potential for career opportunities ahead.

While the succession management process differs from one organization to another, the authors explain that there are certain characteristics of an effective program that are universal:

• Smooth transitions. The authors write that having someone to step into an important vacancy is a critical measure of the effectiveness of succession management. However, helping that person transition in a positive manner with all the necessary skills and knowledge is as important and often more challenging to execute.
• The "right" developmental assignments. The authors explain that a successful process includes job assignments that properly prepare candidates for their new positions, as compared to a sink-or-swim approach.
• Meaningful appraisals and feedback. The authors write that objective assessments are essential in order for management to specify what is required for a successful promotion.
• Appropriate selection criteria. The authors explain that a successful succession management system is dependent on the development of competencies for each job, giving everyone involved a clear picture of the skills, values, behavior and attitudes required to succeed.
• A range of good choices. The authors write that a working succession system results in having more than one good person available for a key job. Real success requires choices between two or more qualified people. Copyright © 2004 Soundview Executive Book Summaries

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