The identification and development of senior professional and executive talent in organisations has always been challenging. It is important that behaviour is aligned with business strategy and the drivers of business success. It is apparent that many people in organisations can articulate business strategy, but don’t necessarily understand it. Even when it has been clearly defined, many individuals do no understand what actions and behaviours are necessary to support the strategy.

A blueprint of high-performance behaviour is certainly the starting point to ensure that organisations are able to maximise their success on an ongoing basis. This platform not only provides a clear understanding of those factors that constitute successful behaviours but underpin a disciplined approach to the development and promotion of people to key roles within the organisation.

Critical to this process is ensuring that the appropriate resources are in place or being developed to guarantee appropriate succession and ongoing business performance and success. The identification of individuals who have the appropriate characteristics, or have the potential to develop such characteristics, is often the missing link. In order to assist organisations in moving their processes and disciplines more deeply and effectively into the organisation, Luminary Search is able to offer intensive evaluation of potential in conjunction with existing profile data and behavioural competency frameworks.

In general, the integration of effective succession planning within an organisation faces a number of challenges. The first of these relates to the various cultures within any organisation, particularly diversified organisations. Quite often there are a number of strong, and very definite, streams running through an organisation’s culture and these are stamped by strong and successful executives. They are often founded in strong levels of tradition, with considerable “volunteerism” in belonging and committing effort to the outcome of a specific team. There can be a “cultish” note to this commitment with strong pride in achievement and success; often in highly competitive environments. When these cultural underpinnings come under pressure or are subject to change, then there can be some level of resistance to changes in the usual methods that define progression.

It then becomes important that the strengths within these cultures that have contributed to the success of the organisation be captured, while at the same time enhancing ongoing change processes through a sensitive mix of persuasion and instruction. If we look at a simple model of performance against potential as outlined below, the four quadrants have universal application.

Succession Planning Chart

Assessment of Potential

Luminary Search employs psychological appraisal to assess those characteristics of executives that predict their effectiveness and development needs. These, when analysed appropriately and with reference to position benchmarks, allow the prediction of behaviour and performance, the alignment of executive characteristics and job related criteria. This leads to the specification of the optimum work environment for individuals and the resultant satisfaction that the executive gains through contribution and recognition of worth. The information can be used in a variety of ways:

The first is as an intensive assessment against defined behaviours and performance related characteristics. These will be clearly aligned to the organisation’s competency frameworks. This can be used for talent audit, recruitment or promotion decisions. With executive level assessments, it is often recommended that this data and information be made available to the executive for challenge and review before it is released to the organisation.

The second option involves not only review of any written or published information about the executive, but also face–to-face discussion with a senior consultant. At these sessions, it is appropriate to engage the executive in an assessment of their own competence again the organisation’s criteria. This involves identifying those behaviours that are related to success and the identification of development opportunities for the executive.

The third option is to include some of the three-hundred-and-sixty degree feedback information, if this is deemed appropriate.

The matrix of all the above information provides a very powerful underpinning for further executive development and the formulation of career strategies, both from an individual perspective and from an organisational perspective.