3 Ways to Keep the Leadership Pipeline Full

As baby boomers head into retirement, many healthcare organizations face a leadership crisis. The antidote? Develop your best employees into homegrown leaders.

If your hospital's CEO announced his retirement today, would you be prepared to announce a successor by the end of the week? If you're even the slightest bit hesitant in answering that question, you need to examine your organization's leadership pipeline.

Robust leadership pipelines are the lifeblood of an organization, says Debra Walker, vice president of the healthcare practice group at DDI World International, a talent management consultancy headquartered in Bridgeville, PA.

"There are [health] systems out there where entire executive teams are going to retire in a couple years," she warns. "If everyone leaves at the age they say they're going to leave—[or earlier, they're] going to have a problem."

If you're not sure your organization is prepared, you're not alone. A DDI 2014 Global leadership forecast found that in 2011, only 18% of executives were confident in their leadership pipelines, and by 2014, that number had dropped to 15%.

While it's appealing to consider bringing in new leadership, Walker suggests growing your own. "Your culture might be very, very different, and their leadership style might be very different," warns Walker. "Leaders from outside the organization are often less successful than leaders developed inside the organization."

Great leaders are not born—they are developed over years, given opportunities to learn and supported by their managers, mentors, and colleagues. "Self-driven is a bit of an oxymoron," says Walker. "It takes a village" to groom leaders. Here are three ways your organization can start preparing for its leadership needs now:

1- Identify Potential Diamonds in the Rough
Not every person in your organization is cut out for leadership, but a certain percentage might be capable of developing into leaders. While Walker agrees that most people earmarked as candidates are high performers in their current jobs, that's far from the only criteria human resources and upper management should be looking at when considering who to begin developing for leadership.

Walker suggests the following qualities for leadership candidates:

• A high tolerance for ambiguity and complexity. "When we promote people up a level, things won't get more simple, just more complex," warns Walker. Anyone moving into higher management needs to have a certain level of comfort with the "gray areas" of business and a grasp of complex systems with many moving parts.
• Strong learning orientation. Your candidate must be capable of learning lots of new material in order to do their job—and come up to speed quickly.
• Propensity to lead. "You want someone who will bring out the best in people and can step into leadership role naturally," says Walker. Look for candidates people listen to and respect.
• Get a balance of values and results. You definitely want someone who lives your organization's values within their roles, but you also need someone who has a history of being results-driven and goal-oriented.

2. Create an Acceleration Pool
Once you've identified a small pool of high-potential employees, start putting energy into developing them into qualified leaders—and fast. A talent acceleration pool is a list of designated employees who your organization is making a point of developing for further leadership roles.

Once a candidate is in the pool, seek to accelerate the whole person. Walker suggests a 360-degree evaluation to determine potential weak spots and areas for improvement and further coaching. Areas for improvement can include subject knowledge, leadership training, or seeking to alleviate personal issues like a tendency toward micromanagement or a bad temper.

Walker recalls one physician who needed to learn more about business acumen in order to be properly prepared for a leadership role. As a part of his development, his organization had him negotiate a contract with a health plan. The physician's negotiation was a success, and it was an excellent experience for the candidate.

In addition to keeping your leadership pipeline full, continually developing candidates with high potential will keep your best employees engaged and motivated.

3. Support Your Candidates
While developing your candidates, be aware that they will be stretched to the max— a circumstance known as growth tension. It's vital to ensure a culture where the belief in human growth is institutionalized.

Ensure that the candidate is supported through this period and knows that no one expects them to thrive right away—this is a learning experience for them. Also, make sure they have plenty of people around them they can turn to for help.

You will need buy-in from the candidate's current manager. "The manager needs to remove obstacles for the candidate," says Walker. Make sure the manager understands the importance of this development, and that they have the resources they need to allow the candidate time to dedicate to projects that will allow them to grow.

You should also find a mentor or sponsor for the candidate who can help find challenges and activities to help them grow and provide coaching. "Connect them with people with similar passions," suggests Walker. Have a family-practice physician who you see heading for the C-suite? Find another physician who moved on to a business track. A nurse who you see as being a CNO someday? Find another clinician who became a leader for her to learn from.

Keep developing your employees and keep your pipeline full of candidates who will be ready to take the wheel at a moment's notice. You never know when someone will decide today is the day they're going to retire.