A new method to succession planning.

1. forum.com http://www.forum.com/blog/accelerating-leadership-development-talent-pooling/
Accelerating Leadership Development | Forum Corporation
June 14th, 2011 by Ian Kristic
Spoiler alert: Talent retention and employee engagement rates are significantly lower now
than before the recent financial crisis and subsequent recession. Given the years of cost
cutting and reduction of employee rewards, this is hardly surprising news.
While not surprising, the statistics spell disaster for the ability to deliver against short- and
long-term strategic goals. Business leaders know it. And when we recommend that clients
develop a robust leadership pipeline to ensure a sustainable and continuous flow of leaders
who can execute strategy effectively, they sometimes say, “Yes. But where do we start?”
Accelerated Talent Pooling
One innovative way to start is accelerated talent pooling. This is a dramatic departure from the traditional
succession planning process. Rather than select one or two hand-picked people for each key position,
talent pools accelerate the development of an entire group of high-potential candidates for key leadership
roles. Employees are selected for talent pools not by their place in the traditional hierarchy, but on the
strength of their ratings on capabilities such as intellectual horsepower, technical capability, industry
knowledge, learning agility, and emotional intelligence—and of course on their track record of success.
Talent-pool size depends on the number of targeted key leadership roles, the number of candidates the
organization would like to choose from in filling key roles, and the speed at which the organization is growing.
The advantages of talent pooling and targeting talent development are clear.
Organizations that undertake talent pooling:
Are more agile and readily able to adapt to constant change and uncertainty
Discover leadership from previously untapped sources
Increase cross-functional excellence, often driving innovative approaches to existing opportunities and
challenges
Engage a wider swath of high-potential leaders, increasing retention and engagement
The bottom line
You can identify the key leadership roles that drive the success of your company and assess the strength of
your existing leadership bench to fill these key roles. And, though we’ve focused on identification techniques
in this post, it’s the accelerated development of your talent that will really drive successful execution of your
business strategy.
Talent development resources
We have built and implemented many learning systems for leaders at all levels, and we’ve captured our
experiences and key lessons in our point-of-view paper Align Your Business and Leadership Strategies:
Build a Pipeline of Leadership Talent to Execute Strategy Today and Tomorrow. A strategic development
approach will help your new leaders avoid pitfalls that lead to failure and instead successfully take on their
roles and realize their promise as drivers of the future success of the business.
Also, please look us up at the Talent 2011 Conference at the Mandarin Oriental in London, July 6 and 7.
Talent 2011, now in its sixth year, is an event for organizations seeking to take concrete action and drive
business performance into the future by developing sustainable leaders today and tomorrow.