Competency Isn t a Four-Letter Word

Transcription

1 PART 1 Competency Isn t a Four-Letter Word FINANCIAL SERVICES 1. ESTABLISHING COMPETENCIES 2. IDENTIFYING TOP TALENT 3. DEVELOPING TOP TALENT The Simple Guide to Succession Planning

2 Succession planning starts with the letter C Succession planning the process of identifying, selecting, and grooming talent for future roles is critical to protecting your company s goals. It s really a no-brainer: finding and developing leaders with specific competencies ensures you re always prepared for expected and unexpected vacancies by having a diverse talent pool of ready-to-go successors. This is imperative, as the Financial Services (FS) sector is facing major talent challenges: an aging workforce, Millenials who are attracted to other fields, and hiring teams who lack visibility into their own employees skills and aspirations. Plus, smart succession planning gives you a competitive advantage, as it takes you beyond simply replacing employees and establishes a strategy to create qualified talent that is ready to lead your organization into the future.

3 Knowing succession planning is important and actually planning for succession are two entirely different matters.

4 This may seem like a mountainous task at first glance a pipe dream that requires too many resources to make it a reality. So what can forwardthinking companies do to get started? Begin with competencies Competencies may elicit dramatic sighs from stakeholders, but they re integral to real succession management. Competencies can help FS organizations establish goals, create expectations, identify high-performing talent, and develop a framework for what it truly means to be a leader. It s simple: when it comes down to it, how can you plan for people to grow into positions if you don t know what those positions require?

5 Why integrate competencies into your succession planning?

6 Transcend the replacement mentality Replacing one employee with another isn t succession planning it s just rearranging chairs at the dinner table, and it can also be risky if the new employee hasn t been groomed for the role. Placing the wrong candidates in the wrong positions decreases efficiency and effectiveness, which hampers your growth. Smart FS companies need to create a list of required competencies for every role from the C-suite down. This will serve as a jumping-off point for finding and training the right people and building qualified talent pools, rather than simply praying that the replacement candidate has the right skills to make an impact.

7 More easily and consistently identify talented people Rather than searching for a needle in a haystack, be proactive about succession planning and integrate desired competencies with your recruiting, learning, and performance management initiatives for better management of the entire employee lifecycle. Also, enable hiring teams to look internally to increase talent mobility, which helps attract and keep Millenials, who are often more attracted to other sectors.

8 Do more with less It s easier to build existing human capital than it is to search for new people at every sign of a vacancy. Your current people are strong culture fits and already know your organization s goals. Start developing their competencies this helps your recruiters build internal talent pools for future roles and reduces hiring costs. For employees, it increases engagement and career mobility opportunities. Concerned about where tomorrow s FS execs are coming from? Enable hiring managers to view your entire team s abilities. You ll likely find employees who are ready for more senior roles, or could be, with just a little training.

9 Build a road map for reluctant or hidden leadership candidates Not everyone self-identifies as a leader, even if their managers or colleagues feel they have great potential to be one. Work with them to expand their strengths and develop areas where they may be lacking experience. With a system in place that both builds and tracks competencies, you can find and promote hidden candidates within or across divisions whose stellar performance and leadership abilities might go unnoticed without an easy, consistent way to bring them to the forefront.

10 Build transparency By establishing competencies in your roles upfront, your employees will know both what s expected of them and what will be expected of them if they want to move up in the company. This kind of transparency will not only help employees create attainable career goals, but will also help instill a sense of trust in your organization. Showing your team you have a long-term plan for them increases retention and engagement when they see you re as invested in them as they are in you, they ll go the extra mile.

11 Mergers and acquisitions should guide your talent goals, not sink them As FS organizations continue to consolidate, vacancies will arise, whether or not they re expected. Enable stakeholders with the tools to holistically assess the talent within the new, expanded company s walls. While M&A typically leads to a shakeup among the ranks, your recruiters can view the skills and goals of all your talent to see how they can fill current and future talent holes.

12 Getting Started: Four Steps to Identifying Competencies Conduct a position analysis. Consider asking those already in the position to fill out a questionnaire detailing their top responsibilities, and what skills and behaviors those responsibilities require. You can also achieve this through behavioral interviews or group discussions. Create a competency-based job description from the questionnaire. These insights will drive recruiting and training initiatives. Decide what constitutes high performance and average performance for each competency. If possible, use real-life examples to see what each level of performance looks like. For example, Employee A is a stellar performer. How does Employee A fulfill their job responsibilities? What are the results? Integrate each competency into your performance management system. By using additional tools in Cornerstone s unified talent management suite, you can tie developing competencies into your recruitment, compensation, learning, and succession planning strategy.

13 You ve experienced how Cornerstone s solutions can impact your employees and your business. Now discover how you can integrate competencies and succession planning into the full suite of talent management tools to move beyond simply replacing employees and create pools of qualified candidates. REACH OUT TO YOUR CLIENT EXECUTIVE TO LEARN MORE OR VISIT: CSOD.COM/SUCCESSION 2015 Cornerstone OnDemand, Inc. All Rights Reserved. csod-success Planning-Financial Services part