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GROW TOMORROW’S LEADERS TODAY

Written by: Alan Hosking

Article Overview: A critical factor in the leadership development of your high potential(HIPO) talent is the provision of customised development plans. Research conducted by the Corporate Leadership Council1 in 2005 showed that, while the presence or absence of a development plan seems to have no impact on motivation or retention of highly talented employees, the quality of a development plan (if present) in terms of being customised to the individual and being achievable has a large impact on motivation and retention. Indeed, the opposite also holds true – a development plan that is not credible negatively impacts motivation and retention.

GROW TOMORROW’S LEADERS TODAY

And yet, discussions with many leading global organisations who have enviable programmes of leadership development reveal that even these organisations admit that they do not do so well at putting in place good development plans

WHAT MAKES A GOOD DEVELOPMENT PLAN?
A good development plan:

1. is based on a realistic assessment of current levels of skills and knowledge (competencies). Multiple sources of feedback are very useful here, including the 360° survey. Note, however, that these 360° surveys have to be carefully introduced and supported as they can easily go wrong.

2. is also based on good selfknowledge by the high potential employee of his/her true aspirations and goals. Difficulties in arriving at true aspirations and goals can include:


reluctance to discuss these matters openly with managers;
lack of selfknowledge; and
organisational pressure and expectations.
These issues should not be taken lightly, and finding ways to face up to them and address them should form part of the planning process for leadership development.

3. takes into account important characteristics of jobs that the employee would aspire to as well as organisational realities. Sometimes an organisation may wish to change the profile of people appointed to certain jobs in the future, and these new expectations need to be fully communicated. In the absence of formal company communication, informal communication will occur and may well be inaccurate. With the information technology available today, companies have exciting possibilities to use internal websites to communicate career ladders, job profiles and other career related information.

4. is discussed in an open and honest way with several interested parties, including an immediate manager, HR and functional head at a higher level. One of the highly motivating elements of organisational life for an individual is to see visible commitment of senior people in the organisation to his/her development. Therefore a process which involves senior people in the preparation or validation of the Development Plan can show such commitment.

Many organisations design the process for preparation of Development Plans as part of the performance management system, and allocate the main responsibility to the immediate manager. This is unfortunate in many cases because the high potential employee is very likely to move further up the ladder past his/her immediate manager and therefore a more senior person needs to be involved to understand the real development gaps and to offer a wider perspective on alternative routes to the employee’s career goals

5. has a range of development options which are considered and prioritised. Many line managers will still consider only off-the-job training as content for a Development Plan. Clearly, the range of options is much wider than that and should focus in the first place on onthejob activities such as new and challenging assignments or exposures, and then widen out to include coaching, mentoring, new assignments, training, self study and so forth. Some criteria for prioritising activities should be offered – for example, put a high priority on fairly simple activities that can make a big difference to development

6. uses a sensible time horizon. A one year Development Plan is not very useful for a high potential employee. Firstly, these employees need a longer time horizon to show them that continuing with the company will be worth their while. Secondly, the development planning process usually produces quite a long list of development needs – it does not add to the credibility of the Plan if all the planned activities are scheduled in a short time period when clearly time will not permit all the activities to be completed. A three year Plan seems to strike a reasonable balance.

7. allows for measurable progress. A plan which is not monitored cannot be considered as a credible plan. A high visibility progress review process will demonstrate organisational commitment to the employee. This might include review discussions with the top management team of the company. Activities in the plan should be described in such a way that progress can be tracked and described in a simple way.

BARRIERS TO BUILDING GOOD DEVELOPMENT PLANS
It sometimes seems as if there are far more barriers than enablers to building high quality, credible Development Plans. These might include:

1. Fear of making promises. Many managers view a Development Plan as a promise to promote someone and, quite rightly, fear to commit themselves. However, the emphasis within the plan should be on improving specific behaviours or filling specific knowledge gaps rather than specifying particular moves or promotions

2. Reluctance to create an elite. Some organisations prefer to spread development widely (and therefore thinly) rather than have an “elite” of high potentials. This too often results in too little development of the leaders of tomorrow, leading to decreased retention and increased risk of failure from promotions

3. Culture where honest feedback is rare. Good Development Plans rely on honest assessments of current levels of skills and knowledge and feedback of gaps. Lack of such feedback will result in “window dressing” and wasted resources.

4. Employee reluctance to share real career goals. As discussed above, a way has to be found to really understand the employee’s level of aspiration. If there is no hunger to be promoted, there will be little commitment to the Development Plan.

5. Lack of time. Development takes time, whether it is orientating a person to a new project or assignment or coaching someone in a new skill. Even sitting down and thinking through a good Development Plan takes time. Therefore the business case has to be clear in order to persuade managers to invest time in this process

6. Lack of formal processes and systems. Whilst some managers may be very good at identifying development gaps and helping employees work out a Development Plan, the majority of managers do not have a high level of skill in this area. It is useful therefore to support them with proformas for the Plans, annual timetables, progress review requirements etc as well as some training in the process.

7. Lack of role modelling from the top. If members of the top team do not spend time going through the process of Development Planning and monitoring, it is unlikely that lower levels of management will do this in a sustained fashion.

DEVELOPMENT CULTURE
Some levers can often be found which can be used to promote the building of a sustainable development culture. Places to look for these might be:

1. Existing succession management process. Most organisations have some form of annual succession planning. A new or improved process of Development Planning can be leveraged off this annual event.

2. Existing coaching or mentoring schemes. Such schemes are very popular at present but can sometimes seem to be rather untargeted. The objectives of the coaching or mentoring relationship should be derived from the Development Plan. Research has shown that the clearer the objectives of these relationships, the more concrete the results.

3. Existing executive education schemes. In order to identify real outcomes wanted from attendance at business school events, again such attendance should result from specific development objectives contained in the Development Plan.

4. Existing transfer policies. Some companies encourage people, particularly high potentials, to change jobs often at two or three year intervals. In order to ensure that people do not simply develop the skill of being transferred and settling in quickly, clear development objectives should be set for each assignment (and these should be tracked during and at the end of the assignment). These objectives should be consistent with,
and derived from, the Development Plan.

BUILDING THE FOUNDATIONS
A good place to start is to identify those managers within your organisation (at a reasonably senior level) who are good at identifying development needs and putting Development Plans in place. (There will always be some managers who are naturally good at it, and do it, sometimes despite the prevailing culture.) Work with them to design some principles, a format and system which suit your specific aims and culture, taking into account the above elements and issues.


Penny Abbott is an independent HR practitioner with extensive senior experience within organisations both in SA and globally (pennyabbott@mweb.co.za).


Reference 1 Corporate Leadershp Council is a memberfunded organisation which carries out research into people management issues. See www.corporateleadershipcouncil.com.

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