When it comes to creating a robust and talented workforce, organizations should be looking inward. Internal mobility and succession planning allow companies to develop the talent they already have to step into bigger roles with more responsibilities. While an external hire is sometimes necessary, many companies overlook their own talent pool when it comes to filling the roles they need filled. Plus, internal mobility and succession planning can be a lot more cost-effective and less risky than an external hire.
With that being said, employees don’t always automatically grow into these roles. Their development and skills should be fostered and supported by their company. But what employees are in the right position for development and growth? That’s where workplace analytics can help. Workplace analytics can give you key metrics for internal mobility and succession planning, so you have data-driven insights to create robust strategies for employee development that put the right people in the right positions at the right time. In today’s article, we’ll cover some of both traditional and modern metrics that help you implement internal mobility and succession planning that enhances employee development and retention.
Internal mobility involves moving employees within a company through promotions, lateral transfers or rule changes. Internal mobility is a great way to move talent to roles better suited to their experience and knowledge. Overall, it helps to retain talent and reduce hiring costs. Meanwhile, succession planning involves identifying potential leaders to fill management or leadership roles in the future and developing their talent or putting them on a career track.
Internal mobility increases job satisfaction, as it shows employees that they have the potential to move up and grow in the organization. This leads to a more motivated and committed workforce. Succession planning ensures your organization is prepared for future challenges or gaps in leadership by arming you with a pipeline of employees ready to step into a leadership role.
Both practices are essential for modern businesses that want to retain and attract the best talent while also increasing overall productivity and quality of work. So, mobility and succession are important, but what metrics can help you see how effective your strategies are? Let’s start by looking at some of the traditional metrics for internal mobility.
To measure the effectiveness of internal mobility strategies, organizations traditionally rely on several key metrics. These metrics include:
The average promotion rate measures the percentage of employees in an organization promoted within a specified period of time. For instance, if you have 100 employees and 5 received promotions during the year, you would have a 5% promotion rate. SHRM's Customized Human Capital Benchmarking Report reported an average promotion rate of 6% for 2022, though the number can depend on your industry, the size of the organization or other factors. It’s best to benchmark your numbers to similar companies in your industry to find out what a healthy promotion rate should be.
High promotion rates can indicate that you have a robust pipeline of talent and that career development and growth are readily available at your company. This helps create a culture of growth and development where employees stay because they feel recognized for their work. When there are clear paths to career advancement, you can increase retention and reduce turnover.
Frequency or time to promotion measures how long employees stay in their roles before being promoted. Again, the size of your company and your industry can affect what this average should be, but shorter promotion times can indicate a dynamic internal mobility system while longer times may reveal some obstacles employees have to moving up.
By looking at this metric, companies can identify potential bottlenecks in the promotion process and determine if something needs changing. While not every company needs to be promoting employees yearly, waiting too long between promotions can lead to employees getting disgruntled and leaving. It’s important to find a balance that works for your organization.
Lateral moves are when you move employees to different roles or give them different responsibilities at the same organization level they’re currently working in. Lateral moves are great for creating a more robust skill set for employees that can set them on a faster track to promotions and moving up in the organization.
This can also help keep employees engaged and reduce the risk of burnout as they face new challenges and dive into new opportunities. Additionally, broadening the skill sets of workers with frequent lateral moves helps your workforce to be more adaptable and versatile, as they can take on various roles and responsibilities and fill in departmental gaps as needed.
Tracking skill development and training can help you understand how prepared your employees are for internal mobility. High participation rates in skill development courses and training programs can indicate your employees are engaged with their career futures and ready to take on bigger roles in the company.
Of course, this also requires investment on the company’s part to ensure these skill development and training resources are readily available. But, the investment is worth it, as it can increase retention rates, help employees feel supported and increase overall satisfaction - all in addition to the primary benefit of skill building.
Succession planning metrics focus on identifying and nurturing future leaders within the organization. Some metrics for succession planning include:
Your leadership pipeline strength indicates the readiness of potential leaders in your organization. You can look at the number of employees you identified as having high potential for leadership positions, along with how ready they are for their intended role. With a strong pipeline, you have a steady lineup of employees who are ready and willing to step up as soon as they’re needed. By looking at your leadership pipeline, you can see if there are any gaps and work on identifying employees who can fill those gaps.
Talent pool diversity ensures your company continues to innovate and utilize the skills and thoughts of an eclectic workforce. A diverse talent pool also indicates your organization’s commitment to inclusion.
Inclusive succession planning leads to a more adaptable and thought-diverse leadership team, making your company more competitive and a more attractive place to work for internal employees and potential hires.
Metrics that measure performance and potential look at the past achievements of employees and the abilities of these employees to take on bigger roles or responsibilities. These metrics go hand-in-hand as performance metrics reveal which employees are capable and perform at a high level, while potential metrics indicate their ability to take on new challenges and opportunities.
Finally, successor readiness looks at how prepared employees are to assume leadership roles. You can measure this metric by looking at the skills they’ve developed, the training they’ve completed and other activities that were intended to prepare them for a leadership position. If you have a detailed succession plan in place, readiness can also be measured by how far they’ve progressed in that plan.
Here are some modern metrics for enhanced workforce planning that you can measure with Worklytics:
Collaboration and social influence metrics can show you how often employees are communicating and how they work together. This also helps you identify key influencers in these collaboration networks and how often they’re collaborating with leadership and other peers. Metrics like these can be a good indicator of leadership, as they show these employees work well in a team and are relied on by others in the organization regularly.
Diversity, equity and inclusion (DE&I) metrics go beyond traditional diversity measures to evaluate the fairness and inclusivity of organizational practices. These metrics can include representation, pay equity, promotion rates among different demographic groups and employee perceptions of inclusivity.
Monitoring these metrics makes it easier for organizations to create a more inclusive and equitable workplace, where all employees have the opportunity to succeed and advance.
Employee satisfaction data can give you valuable insights into employee happiness and overall workplace satisfaction. This data is often tied to how employees feel valued in the organization. Tracking benefits, promotions, bonuses and other things employees care about shows you’re invested in their internal mobility and succession. Looking at employee satisfaction data can also show where improvements need to be made to better align the workplace with employee expectations and needs, so they stay around long enough to move up.
Work-life balance metrics evaluate how much time and effort employees spend at work compared to their personal lives. Data on overtime, time since vacation, after-hours emails and other metrics can indicate if employees are overworked and overburdened. By identifying these issues, you can support employees and prevent burnout and turnover.
Promoting a healthy work-life balance leads to better retention, which means more internal mobility and keeping employees who could step into leadership positions.
Work engagement metrics can help give insight into how engaged and committed employees are toward their work and the company. Highly engaged employees are typically more productive and more likely to stay at the company for the long term. Tracking engagement metrics like focus time, development activity, communication trends and more can identify employees who are involved and motivated to improve and move ahead in the company.
Key performance indicators (KPIs) across the employee life cycle, such as onboarding success, time-to-productivity and retention rates, provide a comprehensive view of the employee experience. These metrics can identify areas where the employee experience can be improved, in turn improving internal mobility and succession outcomes.
Traditional metrics have their place in internal mobility and succession planning strategies, but they don’t paint a complete picture. Fortunately, workplace analytics software like Worklytics can provide modern metrics for next-level workforce planning. With in-depth data analytics and insights, you can better understand your workforce as a whole and determine how robust your internal mobility and succession planning is.
Worklytics collects real-time data about your organization, giving you actionable insights into your employee behavior, collaboration patterns, employee life cycles and much more. This empowers you to make data-driven decisions to enhance employee development, internal mobility and succession planning.
Gain a deeper understanding of your workforce with the power of Worklytics. Book your demo today to learn more.
