Examine These Issues Before Promoting
Someone
One of your most important jobs as a
leader is identifying and promoting employees who have the
talent and temperament to manage others. Sometimes the decision
isn’t all that clear cut, of course. Here are some issues
to explore when deciding whether someone is ready for
advancement:
• The employee’s point of view. Has he or she
expressed interest in promotion? Or does the person seem
content to remain in his or her get a sense of where the
employee wants to be.
• The employee’s self-confidence. Can the employee stand up for him or herself?
You want someone who isn’t afraid to make decisions and
defend them-even to you. Will you be willing to listen when
your newly promoted manager disagrees with you?
• The employee’s colleagues. How will the rest of
the department react to the promotion? Will some staff members
resent not being selected? Who will do the employee’s job
after he or she moves up?
• Your promotion criteria. The only valid reason for
promoting someone is to strengthen your organization. If
you’re considering a promotion just to retain the
employee, or because you think you can’t find a better
candidate, you’d be better off putting the decision on
hold.
• Your own feelings. Do you feel confident about the employee’s
prospects for success? Are you strongly optimistic or do you
have doubts in the back of your mind? Don’t ignore
intuition or gut feelings-often they tell us things our
rational minds can’t put into words.
-Adapted from Company
Manners, by Lois Wyse (Crown)
Before You Promote an Employee...
Promoting a staff member prematurely can
cause no end of problems for you, for your organization, and
especially for the employee. Ask yourself these questions
before making a decision. Is the
employee:
• Performing
present duties well enough to justify a promotion?
• Experienced
and qualified to do at least part of the new job?
• Willing
to hand over current responsibilities to a new person?
• Enthusiastic
about taking on a new role?
• Familiar
with the new position’s responsibilities and priorities?
• Proficient
in the interpersonal skills necessary to work with others in a
new role?
• Adequately
trained, or willing to be?
• Prepared
to bow out gracefully if the promotion doesn’t work out
as planned?
The more questions you can answer Yes to,
the better the chances for the promotion to succeed. Thoroughly
investigate and resolve any No answers, however, before making
any changes.
-Adapted from Practical
Supervision (Professional
Training Associates)
Source: Manager’s
Intelligence Report
Staff Matters
Internal Promotions:
Losing a Top Performer to the Peter
Principle
By Stephen O’Connor
You know how you just inherently know
certain things to be true. Nobody has to tell you. Things like
the severity of the itch is proportional to the difficulty of
the reach. The hardness of the butter is inversely related to
the softness of the bread. Experience is something you
don’t get until just after you need it. Bills travel
through the mail at twice the speed of checks. We know these
adages to be true.
In the work place, there are also things
that you sometimes know are truly a bad idea but you see them
happening anyway. One of them is promoting one of your top
staff performers into a management position based solely on
their history of being a top performer, without assessing their
management skills. The ability to motivate staff, apply policies
consistently, conduct strategic planning and manage a
budget are not necessarily the qualities of your top
performers.
The temptation to promote from within is
compelling. It’s easier, faster and less costly than
going out into the job market to acquire an accomplished
manager with proven skills. To make the internal promotion
decision based on the issues of cost and time is to miss the
point. Can the person demonstrate the skills necessary to be an
effective manager? Will this internal promotion into management
cause more harm than good? Does the risk of promoting an
unproven manager from within outweigh the considerations of the
recruiting costs of time and money by going to the outside?
These are more important questions than whether your top
performer is entitled to the next management vacancy by
virtue of their productivity or loyalty. Career ladders are
good things but you don’t want to loose one of your top
performers to the Peter Principle because you push them up a
ladder that is missing a few skill rungs.
Shawn Kerachsky is a principal with the
consulting firm 3C Associates Inc., and has written extensively
on this subject. In the Fall 2001 issue of Employment Management magazine,
Kerachsky has isolated eight questions whose answers will
denote the management-ready candidate.
Can they:
1. act more like a coach than a player?
2. step out of the limelight and let their
employees get the glory?
3. handle paperwork and details?
4. organize themselves and their
employees?
5. motivate the employees?
6. spend most of their time planning and
analyzing rather than being with people?
7. listen to complaints and resolve their
employees’ problems?
8. handle personnel issues and possibly
fire someone?
Further, he recommends a three-step
approach to ensure success when hiring from within. Define the
job, determine the required (management) skills, and assess the
person’s qualities as they relate to those requirements.
Kerachsky also advocates personality testing to see if your top
performer has what it takes to be a manager. For more
information, he can be reached via e-mail at skerachsky3C@usa.net.
Consider These Guidelines When Deciding
Whom to Promote
Decisions, decisions, decisions. And few
are more important than choosing whom to promote into a
first-time management position. Select the right person, and
you’re a hero. Select the wrong one, and that
person’s mistakes reflect on you. To make the decision
easier, follow these guidelines:
• Do they really want the job? Everyone wants a promotion — sort
of. People want the prestige. They certainly want the extra
money. But do they want the job? Do they have a natural desire
to manage people or projects? Do their job histories reflect
their ambitions? Have they arrived at this place because
they’ve made the right moves at the right time-or do
their resumes show too many signs of serendipity?
• Do they have the necessary soft skills? Too often people are
promoted because they excel at technical tasks, but little
thought is given to whether they can manage people. Has your
candidate demonstrated effective communications skills? The
ability to spot and nurture talent in others? The patience to
explain difficult concepts or tasks? An ability to bridge gaps
between divergent groups of people?
• Can they let go of their old position? Many employees
really do love their jobs. They enjoy their assignments, feel
camaraderie with their coworkers, and take pleasure in knowing
they’re good at what they do. Moving up may bring higher
pay and prestige, but it may rob them of the emotional rewards
they found in their old position. Don’t promote staff
members without first trying to ascertain whether they’re
prepared to fully embrace their new role.
-Adapted from “Avoid the cost of IT
management promotion failures,” by Joe Santana, on TechRepublic.com
Source: The
Motivational Manager, February 2003
Test Employees Before Promoting Them
As it’s unwise to skip over people
who are ready to be promoted, it’s also unwise to promote
people who aren’t ready to move up. By doing so, you risk
shattering their confidence and forcing them out of the
company. (Most employees will leave before they admit
they’re in over their heads.) Run these tests before you
promote anyone: Give candidates projects similar to the ones
they’ll be doing in their new positions. See how
they handle them. Put them in charge of a team to see how they
manage people. Make sure they have the skills necessary to
succeed at the next level before you move them there.
Source: Leading
for Results
