The Succession Balancing Act

Boomers continue to do things their way. Although most Boomers will be 65 or older by 2025, they’re not rushing out of the workforce. Sixty-eight percent envision a phased retirement. This “unretirement” trend isn’t solely driven by financial needs. Personal fulfillment, preventing boredom and avoiding depression also factor into the decision to keep working.

At the same time, Millennials – who by 2020 will account for 50 percent of the workforce – are actively seeking career growth and leadership positions. And if they don’t see opportunities at their employers, they don’t hesitate to move on. Sixty-eight percent say they expect to leave their current companies.

Balancing the different needs and expectations of each generation is challenging how business and HR leaders think about their talent and succession management strategies.

Flex for Millennials

As a generation, Millennials are looking for experiences, feedback, and mentoring. Traditional annual performance reviews won’t cut it. Quarterly isn’t enough either. Practicing continuous feedback not only supports Millennials, but it also creates a feedback culture that all generations benefit from.

Beyond feedback, current job classifications and structures – combined with Boomers sticking around longer – can keep Millennials who are hungry for upward growth on the bench for too long. When I led multi-generational teams, I definitely faced this conundrum. To strike a balance, I found stretch assignments or high-visibility projects to help challenge young talent and keep them from leaving the company when I couldn’t offer them a promotion right away.

Formalizing this type of flexibility within succession management and talent development is key. By building a transparent and objective inventory of emerging leaders, you engage them in a meaningful way, and you increase the odds they will stick around to seamlessly take over leadership roles after you invest in their development. Ninety percent of Millennials say working for companies with structured succession planning would improve their level of engagement.

Pairing objective, evidence-based tools with traditional qualitative inputs is essential. In my practice, I use the CDR 3D Suite to identify employees who have the behavioral leadership profile that aligns to specific roles they can fill down the road. This type of tool improves insight into who has the right leadership characteristics that will be needed for success. I also utilize the Prophet Predictive Role Profiling Insights tool to gain understanding of the employee’s preference and motivation and how these fit different types of roles. In addition to leveraging these tools to better understand your bench, they’re also effective as new employees join the company, helping to accelerate understanding and minimize the learning curve.  

Tap into Boomers’ strengths

Boomers need to lead the change – and the good news is they want to leave a legacy. When you expand the definition of succession management to openly include the collaboration of those who will be leaving, you enable smoother transitions and create an ideal environment for knowledge transfer.

Best practices include getting senior leaders involved in coaching emerging leaders, participating in new leader onboarding, and creating cross-generational projects. Even more important is incorporating succession strategies into these efforts. When your overall talent management includes transparent discussions about succession and collaborative planning for how it will happen, you create a culture where Millennials see a future, and Boomers can effectively transition into a phased retirement that keeps their knowledge and skills working for your company.

Contact me to talk about how your company can successfully balance different generational needs and create seamless succession management for the future.