Where is Patrick?
Government Succession Planning
Ensure The Right Staff Are In The Right Jobs AT THE RIGHT TIME
Adopting and implementing a comprehensive Government Succession Planning and Management Process is the solution you need and the Mejorando Group is the partner who can help.
Benefits realized from
Government Succession Planning
Why now ?
According to The State of Human Capital Management in Government released in 2023, survey responses about trends and priorities affecting the government workforce showed:
- The following as the areas with the greatest need for staff development in their organizations:
- Government succession planning, 36 percent.
- Continuous learning and development, 28 percent
- Strengthening the pipeline of talent to fill emerging gaps in the workforce, 24 percent
- Top three talent management priorities were:
- Recruiting employees who have the right skills for the job, 53 percent.
- Improving employee engagement, 52 percent.
- Identifying and closing skill gaps, 43 percent
- To increase engagement, respondents have implemented or plan to:
- Increase training and employee resources, 88 percent
- Mentorship programs, 86 percent
Government Succession Planning is a targeted risk-management strategy to maintain the continuity of operations because as employees depart your organization, they take with them the tacit knowledge of how things get done! However, your Human Resources Department can’t be the only one pushing government succession planning, because HR has no authority to set priorities. The two primary factors to create and implement an effective Government Succession Planning process is a top executive who visibly and vocally supports it and a workplace culture that fosters it.
High-performance organizations don’t passively wait for the future. They create the future by investing their time and energy into ensuring the continuity of their leadership talent and organizational effectiveness.
What is Government Succession Planning and Management?
More than simply replacing positions that become vacant, Government Succession Planning is an ongoing process of identifying, assessing, and developing talent to ensure leadership, management and supervisory continuity throughout an organization and moreover, to sustain the performance of the organization. The major focus is that replacements (i.e. bench strength) have been prepared to fill key vacancies on short notice, and that individuals have the development capacity to assume greater responsibilities and exercise increased technical proficiency and expanded management role in their work.
It is imperative to recognize that the process of establishing systematic government succession planning is the equivalent of making a long-term culture change. It can be a major shift in an organization where decision-makers may have been accustomed to filling one vacancy at a time. Government succession planning requires commitment to a longer-term strategic view of talent needs and features several benefits:
- Having identified bench strength in place will help the City meet both long-term and emergency leadership, management and non-supervisory needs at all levels.
- Growing your own sends a positive message throughout your workforce. Promoting people is good for morale – and essential to a positive organizational culture. People will want to join and stay with your organization since it develops its own people. And promoting from within is consistent with an empowerment philosophy that encourages people to take on responsibility, assume risk and grow through their achievements.
- The organization will have a clearer sense of an internal candidate’s strengths and opportunities for improvement as well as access to more and better data on that person’s performance than you would with outside candidates. Therefore, you will be able to make more informed and accurate selection decisions.
- It helps align human resources with strategic directions of the organization.
The Mejorando Group Difference
Ours is a firm that has deep roots in the field of building a stronger workforce through the use of an integrated and unified Government Succession Planning Program. Since our inception in 2002, we have designed and implemented several government succession planning programs for a number of public sector organizations and Patrick Ibarra has been published extensively in the area of government succession planning and spoken at scores of conferences advocating progressive and practical methods to effectively transition from the workforce you have to the workforce you need.
We possess extensive experience and in-depth expertise that is highly compatible with the requirements of public-sector organizations. We have partnered with leaders from a number of government organizations serving as the architect (designer) and contractor (implementer) of systematic and comprehensive Government Succession Planning Programs:
- Collaborating with organizational leaders in crafting program objectives and components.
- Completing Workforce Demographic Analyses to identify at-risk positions.
- Designing and presenting learning/training workshop(s) that focus on Government Succession Planning – the concept and application – to executive leadership teams and employee task forces enabling government succession planning to move forward with the proper support and understanding necessary for its effectiveness.
- Providing specific improvements to recruitment, selection and promotional practices and processes.
- Designing program components including candidate selection process for Leadership and Management Development Programs.
- Designing and delivering a large number of competency based workshops for all levels of the workforce – front line, supervisory, senior management and executives.
- Facilitating the process to adopt competencies for front-line employees, mid-managers and executives.
- Administering 360-degree feedback assessment instruments of select employees.
- Delivering executive education programs.
- Designing and implementing Knowledge Transfer Programs.
- Providing performance coaching to a range of management and executive level employees.
Our experience and expertise will ensure your organization adopts a forward-looking, practical and productive Government Succession Planning Program to accelerate the successful transition from the workforce you have to the workforce you need.
Click here to complete a free 20 question survey to determine your organization’s readiness for government succession planning.
Success Stories
City of Tracy, California
The Mejorando Group was retained to design and implement a comprehensive and systematic government succession planning process for an 800-employee organization. This program identified critical positions (i.e. jobs) within the city workforce, specific improvements for recruitment, selection, training, development, and performance management practices, and created a pilot government succession planning process that included selection of candidates and delivery of a competency-based management training program
City of Torrance, California
The Mejorando Group was retained to design and implement a comprehensive and systematic government succession planning process for a 1,300-employee organization. This program identified critical positions (i.e. jobs) within the city workforce, specific improvements for recruitment, selection, training, development, and performance management practices, and created a pilot government succession planning process that included selection of candidates and delivery of a competency-based management training program.
Coachella Valley Water District (CA)
Designed and implemented a targeted Knowledge Management Program comprised of a series of practical and proven techniques to transfer tacit knowledge from seasoned employees. The transfer of high-valued knowledge is an effective strategy to maintain continuity of operations.
“I found Patrick Ibarra’s workshop on Government Succession Planning extremely helpful. His thought-provoking presentation made me aware of how critical it is for any organization to plan for and groom the next generation of leaders. Especially with the approaching retirement of much of the Baby Boom generation. I’m already using his ideas and strategies to ensure the long-term performance and competitive position of my department.”
“We knew that we needed a comprehensive, practical approach to government succession planning and employee development, but we didn’t know how to get there. Patrick Ibarra looked at our specific circumstances and helped us develop an effective program to develop employees, keep valuable knowledge within the organization, and improve the city’s recruitment efforts. City Councils can be very difficult to sell on things, but Patrick’s professionalism and expertise (not to mention his humor) made him credible and trustworthy from the very beginning. We’re very pleased with the work he’s done, and would recommend him to any organization looking to establish an effective government succession plan.”
As consultants to government organizations, the members of the Mejorando Group provide expertise in all aspects of performance improvement and organizational effectiveness services, including government succession planning, leadership and management development and training, strategic planning, performance coaching and group/development/team building.