Recognizing the Right Candidates to Promote

Since we now have a solid understanding of how a poor promotion can kill profitability, let’s dig into what we need to look for when considering existing team members for a leadership role we need to fill in our organizations. I’ve seen firsthand just how valuable an internal promotion process can be for a company. In fact, having the opportunity to apply, interview, and accept different positions played a significant role in me staying with the same organization for nearly two decades. According to an article from Censia.com called The Many Benefits of Internal Promotion, applying this practice can help capture profit in several ways. The author suggests the candidate will stick with the role longer because they know what to expect, that it saves time and money versus hiring externally, and it can increase engagement, retention, and overall performance.

As I read through everything listed for each, I had to agree… Promoting the right team member can pay dividends for years and years to come, both in that individual’s performance as well as with many of the team members who are able to observe the process taking place. To that end, I always emphasized career growth opportunities in the hiring process - especially when the position paid a little less to start but had a much higher pay range long term. As a quick side, that only works more than a few times when it’s true but I’ve seen far too many recruiters attempt it when they have no intention whatsoever of helping the individual actually take advantage of it…

With that in mind, I’m going to stress that promoting the wrong internal candidate can have just as much - if not more - of a negative impact on the profitability in each of the areas that article detailed! I’ve certainly seen that happen and I’m sure you have too!

A year or two before I accepted responsibility for the internal job posting process at the manufacturing facility I was with, I saw a great example of how much impact this can really have. In one particular department, a fellow applied for a lead role a couple of times in a role. In each case, someone with more seniority and more experience troubleshooting each specific machine in that department was awarded the position. The challenge in each of those cases though was that the individuals with more experience had far worse relationships with the majority of the other folks they would soon have some authority over, where the candidate with slightly less technical experience had developed great relationships with his coworkers.

Here’s where I’ll remind you of that Harvard Business Review statistic suggesting that “Increased commitment can lead to a 57% improvement in discretionary effort—that is, employees’ willingness to exceed duty’s call. That greater effort produces, on average, a 20% individual performance improvement…” I doubt I have to spell out the level of commitment the ones who were promoted actually got from the coworkers who didn’t really like them when they were peers… Not only were many of them constantly frustrated with the individuals selected for the role, they were also very critical of the process that awarded them the position rather than their coworker who had earned their respect.

Don’t get the wrong idea here, I absolutely believe that technical skills, experience, and tenure are critical things to consider for any position. But when that position carries leadership responsibility, regardless of how formal or informal the authority is that comes with it, those cannot be all the decision is based on!

After that position was open a few times and being offered the backup role each time, which was about once each year, the fellow stopped applying for the lead role altogether. He even stopped applying for other roles internally, but he didn’t stop looking for opportunities to grow. It didn’t take long for him to find one either! Soon after finding a good opportunity, he bought the business and has grown it each year since. And that same guy that didn’t have enough experience to be a lead in a small department was recently named “Entrepreneur of the Year” by his local Chamber of Commerce.

When all things are equal, an individual’s capacity to lead a team can make a far bigger impact on their success when promoted than their current technical ability. Even when all things aren’t equal, how they lead will still make a bigger impact. And while promoting someone with only strong technical skills or the most experience may produce slightly better results right away, other issues can arise soon after so that’s where we’ll pick up next time…