It may be counterintuitive, but proactively developing a system for identifying future healthcare leaders doesn't incent them to jump ship. Instead, this strategy keeps employees engaged and productive, one Pennsylvania health system finds.
Think your healthcare organization doesn't need succession planning? Consider this non-healthcare example and think again.
Jerry Junkins, the CEO of Texas Instruments, saw no need for a succession plan. "I'm as lean and healthy as a horse," he said in 1996 at the age of 58. A few months later, he had a heart attack while on a business trip to Germany and died. With no clear successor in place, Texas Instruments, once a technology juggernaut, scrambled for over a decade to recover from the leadership crisis.
In the tumultuous culture surrounding business and politics, leadership positions commonly have to be replaced at a moment's notice because of illness, death, or unexpected resignation, for which there seem to be an endless variety of explanations, including allegations of bribery, mysterious disappearances, and other "personal reasons."
These are not rare events and healthcare is not exempt.
But many healthcare leaders are reluctant to discuss succession planning—these are people for whom work is a very important part of life, and they frequently avoid planning for the inevitable. Often, it's HR who will have to bring it up, likely persistently. But that persistence will pay off if it helps avoid a leadership crisis.
An Ounce of Prevention
Some organizations within healthcare have wisely begun trying to prevent the succession crisis before it starts.
Lancaster General Health, a regional, not-for-profit healthcare system in Lancaster, PA decided in 2009 that healthcare leadership is too important to leave to chance. The leadership team proactively began developing its own talent pipeline internally.
LG Health has developed a system of identifying potential leaders, evaluating their skills, taking their own interests and aspirations into account and then developing the candidates to move into leadership positions, rating them as "ready in 3–5 years," "ready in "1–2 years" or "ready now," according to how developed their leadership skills are.
"This is not just a talent review process," said Kay Brady, vice president human resources, talent management and organizational development at LG Health. "All our leaders are assessed," she told me, adding that employees at the director level and above participate in professional development programs which are developed in collaboration with Harvard Business Publishing's ManageMentor division. During yearly reviews with their managers, employees decide which modules of the program make the most sense for them to complete.
Not-So-Secret Formula
LG Health relies on the 70/20/10 formula for professional development supported by Harvard Business Publishing. According to the formula, 70 percent of talent building is based on experience. Examples of how to develop this include employees taking on expanded roles within their current departments or being assigned interim positions in different departments to develop the skills necessary to become effective leaders.
Twenty percent of development involves feedback, such as coaching or mentoring; and 10 percent of the development process should ideally come from personal learning, including online courses, lectures and reading.
Other development techniques LG Health employs include learning groups called leadership development cohorts, an MBA program developed for physicians and hospital administration at St. Joseph's University, and a Harvard executive education program for VP level employees and above.
Brady said that while they do follow the 70/20/10 guidelines, every employee's plan is "highly individualized" and tailored to each person's specific developmental needs. "We take a close look at the leaders we want to develop, and compare them to what will likely become available. Often, we develop projects with high-potential leaders in mind," said Brady.
Brady has real-life examples of how LG Health has used this strategy to keep employees engaged and productive while also protecting its talent pool. She says it's not uncommon to take employees out of clinical roles and move them to administration. "We had a director of nursing who we thought could benefit and be benefitted by being in IT," she said. That nurse oversaw the implementation of the HER system, then went into LG Health's Health Access department, and is now in a population health role.
Square Pegs?
One criticism of leadership succession planning is that it can lead to people being pushed into roles they don't really want based on the needs of the company above the aspirations of the employees themselves. Brady resolutely maintains that this is not the case.
"No, we definitely don't do that," said Brady. "On our succession plan, we may have one VP appear in 3 different potential slots regarding where he could go. Every step of the way, we ask, 'What are your career aspirations? Where would you like to go?'"
Brady said that there are no downsides to succession planning that her organization has found, but that there have been many benefits. Their organization is performing above talent retention metrics published by PricewaterhouseCoopers, and LG Health a better developed, more nimble workforce.
"This policy has given us more insight into strengths of leaders and their competencies. It really allows us to be proactive in preparing for the future," Brady said.
Lena J. Weiner is an associate editor at HealthLeaders Media.