What is a Succession Planning Talent Review Meeting?

Despite the potential of being an essential element of succession planning and talent management, talent review meetings - or the talent review board as it is sometimes known - can be shrouded in mystery as to what takes place.  

From our conversations with clients we know that people 'get' that talent reviews should be an integral part of a business' people strategy and to help it make the best use of its assets.

But the reality is that, organisations either haven't yet got these up and running or they're simply getting the value form them or meeting the needs and expectations of either the senior team or those sitting in your talent pool.

Let's take a step back.

What is the purpose of the succession planning meeting or talent review? 

The Succession Planning Talent Review meeting maps out the business needs of the organisation - or of a specific business area - against the capacity, capability and potential of the people within it. It is also often the mechanism by which High Potential people (HiPos) are brought into the organisation's accelerated promotion or development programmes.

Of course, Talent Reviews will look considerably different from business to business, but generally they consist of:

a series of structured, facilitated meetings where employees are reviewed in terms of their key strengths, career goals, degree of readiness for promotion, development needs and their development plans. 

Who attends the Talent Review Meeting?

Usually it is a manager’s responsibility to represent their employees at this meeting and it is the responsibility of HR to oversee the process and calibrate the evidence and information shared.

The outputs of these meetings are generally captured on either a summary spreadsheet, or more commonly, a Performance/Potential or a 9 Box Grid.

The structure of the Talent Review 

A typical succession planning meeting like this may take on the following process. 

Before the meeting there is an initial assessment made of those individuals who will be discussed at the review meeting. of the talent brought to the meeting for review - or those already in the talent pool. Part of this, is a determination of the level of potential - and well as performance. How potential is measured will be an area for consideration.

With such an evaluation done, each individual is mapped onto a 9 Box Grid - or a Performance/ Potential Grid. 

Debate and discussion will follow - but if you have the measures in place which have determined the potential and performance of these people, their placing on the grid won't need to be changed. Indeed, make sure that you are using talent succession planning software that automatically takes the ratings and generates the 9 Box Grid.

From here, typically people are put forward into accelerated programmes and into the talent pool. They may be earmarked as successors for a specific role - or indeed for more than one role. Either way, solid and regular communication with these people is essential. Organisations that fail to communicate the outcomes of the talent review meetings, are losing one of the essential elements of the succession planning process. 

Find out more about how to introduce succession planning and how to run talent review meetings. You're likely to need some succession planning software too. 

When you're ready to talk about how we could support your succession plan strategy and designing the succession planning template that is right for your organisation - or just to see some succession planning examples, do get it touch.