Anita Wingrove, Director of Assessment and Succession Practice at Korn Ferry, explains the role of board in CEO succession.

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Transcript 

Hi everyone, I’m Anita Wingrove and I look after the Assessment and Succession practice for Korn Ferry here in Australia, and also lead the solution across APAC.

You may have listened to the webinar that we ran recently on reimagining succession. We had a fantastic turnout and really fantastic list of questions. And one topic that came up time and time again in the questions we received related to boards, what is on the mind of boards in relation to succession planning?

And when we think about this topic, we think about it, obviously CEO succession, it is the number one role of the board to really ensure that there’s a strong successor for the CEO.

And of course in this climate, the level of disruption and disintermediation, the fourth Industrial Revolution, global changes and so forth, the role of the CEO has never been more complex. And therefore, the role of boards in really ensuring that they’re developing the next generation of CEOs is really important.

And so, as executives in organizations it’s our role to really ensure that we’re building the best practices and processes, and policies to really shore up the identification and the development of CEO successors.

But the second aspect of this is also in relation to bench strength. We find that boards are increasingly asking organizations about the quality of the bench more broadly in organizations.

And this is really important for two reasons. One is succession, we know that there are key roles in each organization that really require to have very strong succession plans to really ensure that you’ve got the pipeline of talent.

The second is really about de-risking the organization, and again, in an environment of increasing regulation, raised external scrutiny, the democratization of consumers as it relates to social media and so forth.

The increasing role of organizations in the communities in which they operate, it’s really important that leaders have the breadth and the capacity to really lead in complex environments and really anticipate and be the disrupters of change, rather than having change imposed upon them.

And so, this notion of succession for risk is a really interesting area that boards are pinpointing and really seeking advice.

And they’re wanting to seek assurance that organizations, again, have the policies, processes, and systems in place to ensure they’ve got the best people in those roles, those key roles, and of course building the talent pipeline for those roles.

So in a nutshell, they’re the key topics that we see at large, as we work with our clients across the globe and here in APAC.

And hope this is helpful insight for you as you continue your own development, and your own journey in your organizations. Thank you.

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Michelle Peterson, Client Partner at Korn Ferry, shares comments on how to bring diversity to your pipeline of top talent.

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Transcript

One of the great questions that has come up in a recent talent and succession webinar is, “How do we have a greater representation of female leaders particularly in P&L roles?”

And it is a significant area of investment that we’re working with a lot of our clients on right now and don’t see that changing in the future.

And our first lens that we look at and really share with our clients is that this is not a quick fix. It’s a really long term sustainable investment that begins with your middle management layer.

And we do believe really strongly in a build and buy strategy and often we would ask our clients the question of not is this female the best person for the role but the question moves to can she do the role. And if the answer is yes, we move to the next question which is, “What support, infrastructure, coaching and sponsorship does she need to be successful and how do we scaffold that around her?”

The third question we move to then is, “Are you prepared to invest in, can you commit to that kind of support and infrastructure?”

So, these are some of the great discussions that we’re having with our clients all the time.

The other thing that I would, or other theme I would mention is that sponsorship plays such a significant role in female success in senior executive positions.

And we do see amazing female P&L leaders start to call us about their next career opportunity when they feel like they’ve lost some of their sponsorship at a CEO or board level. That’s another thing to think about in this great discussion about female P&L talent.

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Rebecca Bose, Senior Principal at Korn Ferry, explains how to assess the competencies needed in your talent pipeline.

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– So at a recent Reimagining Succession Management webinar that we ran, we received a number of questions from participants about how does Korn Ferry assess traits and drivers and is this difficult to assess?

We thought it might be helpful to share some insights into the Korn Ferry approach. So when assessing traits and drivers, we deploy the KF4D tool for measuring 22 personality traits, four drivers, learning agility, and risk factors for the leader in question.

We combined the insights from the KF4D. With structured interviews where our consultants probe some of those aspects in more depth and really find out how those traits and drivers, agilities, and indeed risk factors show up in that leader’s behaviour.

They key, of course, is to combine all of that with other sources of data which we do as well.

I think our best advice to you when trying to measure traits and drivers and assess those well, is to deploy a valid, robust measurement tool.

A tool like the KF4D. We hope that that clarifies something of our approach and if you’d like to learn more, please reach out to me.

 

Rebecca Bose, Senior Principal at Korn Ferry, comments on how to retain the individuals in your high succession program.

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Transcript

In our recent Reimagining Succession Management and Time Potential webinars, a number of participants asked us questions about how best to retain high potential talent.

This is talent that you’ve invested in and you’ve developed and then they leave your organization. It’s such a great question and it’s clearly an issue that’s on many people’s minds.

One of the keys we think is point two in our Reimagining Succession Management white paper. Really this is all about knowing and staying connected to your key talent.

We call this talent intimacy and it’s really tapping into and understanding the key drivers, the aspirations, the level of engagement and the issues on that talent’s mind including issues like pay.

Now, of course exit interviews and indeed tools such as KF Listen can help uncover some of those issues that are on key talent’s mind when it leaves your organization.

We also at Korn Ferry work with clients to review organizational EVP much more broadly to ensure that it’s better aligned with your organization’s strategy.

If you’d like to learn more about any of the things that I’ve mentioned please do reach out to me.