3 Strategies to Get Your Succession Planning Moving by Meridith Elliott Powell

I was speaking in Baltimore, Maryland, at a Healthcare Finance conference. Because I was the closing keynote, I flew in the day before so I could spend some time connecting with some attendees and listening to the other speakers.  

As you can imagine, the topics the speakers covered ranged from leadership to technology to government regulation—pretty standard line-up except for one guy, the speaker who was on before me. 

A professor at the University of Maryland by day, he had started keynoting based on a new book he had published about the future of business. He called himself a futurist, someone who studies the future and makes predictions based on trends.  

He spoke about everything from the disappearance of full-time employment to the role robotics will play in replacing traditional manual jobs. While I did not buy in or agree with all of what he said, when he started talking about the workforce and the future of employees and talent going forward, my ears perked up. 

Beginning with what we all knew, finding great help is hard to find, and there is a virtual war on talent. He then shed some new light on why. He said that today’s workforce, while eager, is far less prepared than our parents’ generation. 

Today’s Workforce 

With baby boomers retiring at rapid rates, either because they want to or age and health are making that decision for them, there is just not enough talent to take their place. The natural succession plan would be Gen X. Roughly ages 38 to 53, they are the smallest of the generations, so just by sheer numbers, there are not enough of them to move into these vital leadership positions. 

In addition, after the recession that started in 2008, many Gen X men did not return to the workforce. Having been hit hardest by layoffs and downsizing, many opted out of the job market, and, unfortunately, it looks like they are staying out for good. 

That leaves millennials (roughly 21 to 37); while they are an even larger generation than the baby boomers, they are not nearly as experienced, according to our futurist speaker. He shared that things like organized sports and helicopter parenting caused millennials to miss the opportunity that lack of parental involvement provides for developing critical thinking and problem-solving skills.  

Boomers grew up in a time when kids walked to school, sports were self-organizing, and parents backed up the teacher no matter if he was right or wrong. Those taught boomers early on how to persevere, be resilient, and solve problems—skills that would prove invaluable in the workforce. 

Millennials bring amazing skills to the workplace; they are just different, and some of these foundational skills still need to be developed. That changes everything about how we view succession planning and the new role they need to play in our corporate culture. We used to have the luxury of waiting to do a succession plan when a leader was actually ready to retire or was thinking about stepping down. In today’s world, succession planning is an ongoing strategy and one of the most vital elements—a core competency—you need to have in place to ensure sustainability and long-term success. Also, it is a strategy that is never complete and needs to be continually updated, communicated, and invested in. 

So, where do you start, and how do you get your succession plan moving? 

Take Inventory— 

First and foremost, you need to understand where you are: what talent you have, what talent you need, and what talent is available in your marketplace. In other words, you need to take inventory. You need to get a clear perspective of what it takes from a talent perspective to run your company effectively. What roles could easily be filled with existing talent, and what roles will you need to recruit for? 

Create Criteria— 

You need to develop your criteria your standards. What do you future leaders need to have in terms of skills, talent, and values? Develop criteria of what it really takes beyond experience and job history to lead your company.  

Start Small— 

Succession planning is not an easy task. There are many moving parts, and there is a lot of required investment in terms of time and resources. So there is no need to develop the entire succession plan in one sitting. Feel free to start small. Begin with the most critical positions—those most vital to the organization and/or those with leaders closest to retirement. Get those succession plans in place, see what is working and what is not, and adjust and continue your succession planning strategy. 

Meridith Elliott Powell is a business strategist, keynote speaker, and award-winning author with expertise in business growth, sales, and leadership strategies. She was named One of the Top 15 Business Growth Experts to Watch by Currency Fair and One of the Top 20 Sales Experts To Follow by LinkedIn. Learn more succession-planning tips in her book, co-authored with Mary C. Kelly Who Comes Next?: Leadership Succession Planning Made Easy (Nonfiction Authors Association Gold Award recipient).

Three Myths That Can Wreck Your Hiring Process by Dr. Rick Goodman

There’s a lot of received wisdom about the hiring process—a litany of “best practices” we’re all supposed to follow. 

The thing is, that received wisdom isn’t always so wise. And the best practices? They’re not always very good. 

You’ve got to be judicious, and to get the ball rolling, I want to highlight three common hiring myths that I believe do more harm than good. 

1. Beware of job hoppers. 

You probably know who I’m talking about when I mention job hoppers—the folks who seem to find a new position every year or so, never staying in one place for long. 

The conventional wisdom is that job hopping is a warning sign, an indicator that the person can’t commit and won’t really be invested in the long run. 

Sometimes that turns out to be true—but I wouldn’t dismiss job hoppers right out of the gate. What you may find, especially with younger employees, is that they’re actually looking for some real leadership, and for a place where they can learn and grow. 

It’s possible they just haven’t found it yet. And maybe you could provide it to them. 

2. Detailed descriptions are best. 

Another myth you’ll run into is the notion that an incredibly detailed job description is best for finding the right match. 

But let me push back against that. Offering a mundane bullet-point list of responsibilities may not attract the best candidates. In fact, it might just bore them. 

So, what if you wrote a job description where you emphasized values and mission but also left some room for really talented employees to come in and tell you how they would shape the position in question?  

That may be the best way to bring in a really exciting crop of applicants. 

3. Experience is key. 

Obviously, it can be advantageous to find applicants with a certain level of technical expertise. But does experience trump teachability? Is having a long resume a substitute for passion? 

I think these qualities can offset a lack of technical expertise—and in some cases, they may actually be more important. 

Those are my thoughts—and I’d love to hear from you. Tell me your take on common hiring myths. You can reach out to me any time! 

Hit me up at www.rickgoodman.com or call 888-267-6098. You can also learn more in my book The Solutions-Oriented Leader, which provides step-by-step advice on transforming your life, your business, and your team—including your hiring process. 

6 Smart Tips for Hiring Smarter by Shawn Doyle, CSP

One of the biggest downfalls I see in leaders is they don’t have great interviewing skills. For you to be successful, you must become an expert at interviewing. What we have to realize is that the work is not done by the leader; the work is done by the team. Therefore, if we hire the best team, we get the best results.   

Tips for Hiring Smarter  
Here are six tips for ensuring that you hire the best:  

1. Make it your goal to find the best. 
   I see leaders in many industries settle for a candidate who seems okay but is not the best of the best. If you do that, you’ll pay for it later. Be the tortoise, not the hare. Take your time, be patient, and make sure that you’re hiring the cream of the crop. 

2. Always be looking for new talent. 
   When you attend industry conferences and meetings and as you network, stay on the lookout for new talent. Sometimes when we least expect it, we come across the talent we will someday want to be on the team. Talk to them and get to know them professionally. Perhaps even ask them to send you a resume, and put it in your file of future talent. Keep in touch with this talent on a regular basis, and when you are ready to make a move, you now have a very strong “best of the best” candidate.   

3. Become an interviewing artist. 
   Really strive to become a master interviewer. This is a skill and a science. Identify people in your organization who are known for being great interviewers. Ask them if you could sit in on one of their interviews. Be the proverbial “fly on the wall” and observe their techniques and approaches. I learned all of my best interviewing skills from a gentleman named Filemon, an executive to whom I once reported. He taught me the subtleties of effective interviewing approaches and techniques. If internal training on effective interviewing is available, take advantage of it. Secondly, read and study books and online courses on effective interviewing—you will find that you will learn a lot.  

4. Have multiple interviews with multiple people. 
   In my experience, I have found that interviews that incorporate multiple people and that require the candidate to come back for several interviews are much more effective. Why does this work so well? The reason that this is so effective is that each time the candidate comes back for an interview, he or she becomes more relaxed and comfortable. This allows you, as the leader, to get beyond the techniques that they’ve learned in their interviewing books and classes and get to the real person. Additionally, if multiple people are interviewing the candidate, there may be areas identified by one person that were not identified by another. The reason for this is simple: some people have chemistry with one interviewer and not another. I once had a very strong candidate whom I interviewed two times and was practically ready to make them a job offer. That is when it got very interesting! I took the candidate to lunch for a third interview, and over lunch she revealed some ethical problems that she had in her last job (plagiarism), which clearly told me that she was not appropriate for our team. I believe that this would not have been revealed if we had only done two interviews and if she had not been interviewed by multiple people. By the way, you’ll notice the classic technique mentioned above—the all-important, infamous “meal” technique (which, by the way, works like a charm). If you want to find out more about the real person, get them to dine with you. The candidate will disappear, and a real person will emerge.   

5. Look for internal hidden assets. 
   I often find that in corporations and organizations, there is hidden talent just waiting to be discovered. I was once a vice president of training and development for a large company. I received a resume from an internal candidate who wanted to fill the position of trainer. I called the human resources department and asked them why they sent me her resume. They explained that even though this candidate worked in the accounts payable department, she had indeed developed and designed a significant amount of training on her own to train accounts payable people around the country. “Besides,” the HR person said, “you have to interview her—she has passion!” Of course, we interviewed her, and after several interviews and a live training audition, she was hired as a trainer. So we discovered a talented trainer who was buried in another department in the organization who was truly a hidden asset.  

6. Hire for diversity. 
   Great leaders hiring people are always are looking for diversity. Yes, I know it’s the right thing to do, and it adds greatly to the company’s PR reputation. The fact that leaders are sensitive to and addressing diversity issues in terms of hiring has great value. But I think there’s a more important reason—the real reason—why you should hire for diversity. You should hire for diversity in order to get people who think differently. My definition of hiring for diversity means that you get people on your team who are completely different than you. You get diversity in race, creed, color, ability, religion, geography, lifestyle, age, culture, etc. The advantage of having this kind of diversity on your team is that each person brings a unique perspective to both the projects and the work. That way, you get a much broader range of opinions. So, hire people who are completely different than you—in fact, the opposite of your own image. Hire people radically different than you.  

Those are the key strategies for interviewing. Print this out and tape it to your desk. It will pay off when you are looking for your next “superstar.” 

For more business and personal development insight from Shawn Doyle, check out his titles from Sound Wisdom, including his Jumpstart Series, The Sun Still Rises, The Leadership Manifesto, and Two Months to Motivation.