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Promotion – Who is responsible?

Hello All,

I was at a breakfast seminar yesterday and the topic was “Leadership Succession: What’s in store for the next level”.  It was a lively group of people and we spoke about the importance of developing talent and promotion from within.  An interesting case study was presented.  An individual was promoted from a technical role into a senior operations role at a director level with no training, guidance or experience.  It was no surprise that she was burned out, worked long hours and also fell victim to mass turnover in her department.  This is common across many companies who promote to retain, motivate and recognize employees.  My question – Does the organization have an responsibility to guide, assist and fill the knowledge gap when promoting employees to roles outside of their expertise?

I’m interested in your thoughts?

This entry was posted on Thursday, May 29th, 2008 at 9:21 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

3 Responses to “Promotion – Who is responsible?”

  1. Bhinder Sajan Says:
    June 5th, 2008 at 2:01 pm

    Hi there,

    I love this topic! I think a lot of people think that managers will “learn on the job,” or that they’re “smart enough to figure it out.” While that may be true, think of the costs lost in productivity while the person takes the long way around. And, in the example you’ve provided, it impacted the entire team, because, really, who wants to work for a manager who is “figuring it out?” Most of us want to work for someone who knows what they’re doing, and who can inspire us to do more. Definitely the job of the organization to ensure managers have the skills do their jobs.
    b

  2. Brenda Rigney Says:
    August 18th, 2008 at 10:40 am

    Hello:

    This is an ongoing issue in most industries. Organizations typically assess people on their ability to do their current job, but not on whether they have the potential to do a job 1-2 positions higher. When grooming someone for their next step on the ladder, think further out and focus the development plan in that diretcion!

  3. Ian Cook Says:
    September 19th, 2008 at 2:54 pm

    The notion of responsibililty is challenging as it puts the organization in a paternalistic role. I would be more inclined to say the investment in supporting learning is just good business sense – and is a fraction of what over promoting costs in turnover, lost produtivity etc.

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