The King is Dead ... Long live the King

In ancient imperial times, the right of succession was a relatively simple process. In the majority of cases father was simply replaced by son. This was regardless of such issues as intelligence, talent or competency. Nowadays, any organisation adopting such a simplistic and risky approach would surely be doomed to failure. This is why so many companies invest great amounts of time and money in succession planning.Succession planning is a great way of ensuring organisations can continue to operate smoothly even after an integral team member moves on. However, a function of succession planning that is all too often overlooked is as a retention tool.

Let me offer two examples - one positive and one negative - of the impact succession planning can have on your organisation.The first example comes from back in 2002 at the very start of my own career. I had taken a job working in the marketing department of a major British newspaper company. Both the position and the salary were ok, but not great. However, I had been persuaded to take the role by the promise of rapid advancement through the organisation. Unfortunately, by 2004 this advancement had not taken place and I felt that I was treading water.I was certainly disappointed that I had not been given the chance to advance. However, I was concerned more with the fact that I had no idea how or where any future advancement would happen. My manager had failed to identify any roles he saw me filling in the future and offered no guidance on areas I needed to improve. My only hope was that one of the older employees would retire or get a better offer elsewhere. The problem with that approach was that I did not know how long it would take for my opportunity to arise.

Eventually, after 18 months I grew tired of waiting and decided to go elsewhere.Let's contrast that experience with those of my friend Mike. We graduated from university in the same year and got our first job at around the same time. However, even though he was originally paid less than me, Mike is still with his company. The simple reason for this is that his company communicated to him from day-one the direction in which they wanted him to progress. They gave him a clear career-plan outlining how he could climb their corporate pyramid. This included a timetable for this progression and criteria he needed to meet in order to qualify.The difference between Mike and myself was that he was safe in the knowledge that, if all went well, he would progress within the company. I, on the other hand was left to wait and hope. So, when I got an attractive offer from another company, I was happy to leave.