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Part 

4

  People Resourcing

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Management succession 

planning

Management succession planning is the process of 

ensuring that capable managers are available to fill 

vacant managerial posts. Three questions need to be 

answered: first, are there enough potential succes-

sors available – a supply of people coming through 

who can take key roles in the longer term? Second, 

are they good enough? Third, do they have the right 

skills and competencies for the future? At different 

stages in their careers, managers may be categorized 

as  being  ready  to  do  the  next  job  now,  or  being 

ready for a specified higher-grade position in, say, 

two years’ time, or as a high-flyer on the ‘A list’ who 

has senior management potential. Such assessments 

generate development plans such as leadership and 

development programmes, special assignments and 

job rotation.

As noted by Iles and Preece (2010: 256), succes-

sion  planning  can  be  seen  in  terms  of  identifying 

successors  for  key  posts  and  then  planning  career 

moves  and/or  development  activities  for  these  

potential successors. They suggested that:

Processes need to be designed round purpose, 

population, principles, process and players, with 

senior management engagement and HR 

championing. The highest potential employees are 

thus offered accelerated development and career 

paths. Of course, the downside is that non-selected 

employees may feel that they are less valued and 

have less access to development opportunities.

They also commented that in reality few companies 

have such programmes and that some are critical of 

attempts to equate succession planning with talent 

The  overall  aim  of  talent  management  within  IBM  is  ‘to  

develop  the  leaders  of  tomorrow’.  Part  of  what  makes  it  

a  global  company  is  the  importance  it  places  on  high- 

potential people gaining international experience. For em-

ployees,  being  identified  as  talent  therefore  drives  many 

opportunities in the company.

Every  leader  in  the  company  has  responsibility  for  

identifying  and  nurturing  talent.  The  areas  for  them  to  

look for are aptitude, potential and the ability to grow and 

develop. The identification of talented individuals is based 

on their performance against 10 leadership competencies, 

which  are  consistent  globally.  The  leadership  com-

petencies are used as a development tool for employees  

at all levels in IBM, not just those already highlighted as 

having potential.

Readiness for promotion to executive roles is linked to 

competencies. For example, if an individual needs to get 

client relationship-building skills, then his or her next job 

has to include that. Readiness is categorized in terms of 

‘next job’ or ‘two jobs away’ rather than a number of years.

IBM

Standard Chartered Bank

As reported by the CIPD (2010c), Standard Chartered was 

looking closely at its existing approach to talent manage-

ment. This has involved:

 

●

re-examining the processes, to ensure that there is 

greater transparency, education and understanding 

about the importance of robust talent identification  

and development;

 

●

embedding talent processes to establish clearer links 

between our talent processes and other global people 

processes around performance management and 

engagement;

 

●

encouraging more experiential-based learning centred 

more on on-the-job learning and learning from others;

 

●

providing support to help our managers and leaders 

engage and motivate their teams;

 

●

ensuring that talented staff continue to perform above 

their peer group, are highly engaged and that they are 

retained.

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