Succession management is undergoing fundamental change: Study

Career and succession management is undergoing fundamental change largely due to skill shortage and also as young employees are valuing varied working experience to traditional linear career growth, a study says.
According to Top Employers Institute, a global that identifies top performers in the field of human resources, it is no longer possible for HR managers to try and hold on to top performers, applying the traditional set of incentives.
"What is needed is a broader approach to employee development with greater awareness for the changed needs and values of the younger workforce. HR managers have to move away from being talent hoarders to playing their part as talent producers," Top Employers Institute CEO David Plink said.

The study noted that to successfully cope with retention challenges, strategic workforce planning has to be closely linked to career and succession management.
"If you want people to stay long term, and not to go anywhere else, then they need to know why they are staying, and that is very much a performance discussion, but more importantly a career discussion," Antoinette Irvine, HR Vice President at Unilever said.
The most common career and succession management practice is an online personal development plan with as many as 85 per cent of top performing companies have this in place, followed by competency models (79 per cent), and employee profiles (75 per cent).

The Career and Succession Management Report is based on a global HR Best Practices Survey among 600 companies in 96 countries.