Under the traditional scheme that companies managed until a good part of the 90s of the 20th century, talking about career plans was an attractive project or an important sign of the interest that the organization had in the growth and development of the personnel within it.
In Venezuela, the oil industry is the standard-bearer in the planned and effective use of the application of career plans, these became such a significant value for that sector that from their exercise and practice the word “meritocracy” was incorporated into business language ”, Which can be understood, from a simple perspective and without the intention of covering all its content, as the power exercised by professional and individual merit to achieve a superior position within the company.
Career plans are nothing more than a set of steps and levels distributed in years of experience, academic levels, quality of performance and other factors of relative importance that are offered to the new employee and the active worker with the firm intention of motivating them. and offer you a prosperous future based primarily on your effort. It is not a matter of chance or subjective decisions, if the necessary points are achieved to reach a superior position and this is vacant, the individual can claim what is due.
Faced with such a promising scenario, anyone could assume that not only are career plans wonderful, but that they would have to be applied in all organizations, however this management tool is based on a paradigm that today is difficult to accept as a valid premise: The eternal presence of the employee in the same organization.
Although it is true that in the past, job stability was understood as an almost matrimonial relationship between the employer and the employee, whose only separation would occur with death, since even in retirement he could offer his services as a consultant, the concept has changed and currently it is not possible to start from a disused premise, since elements such as employability are becoming increasingly stronger.
Contemporary professionals are in a constant search for growth and in the expectation of new challenges, the permanence in a company depends mainly on its ability to balance and maintain such demands for as long as possible, so it is naive to assume that before the absence of these two elements will be able to retain and maintain the talent recruited, making it even more difficult to plan a growth in years whose feasibility will depend on exogenous elements present in the offers made by the labor market and other endogenous ones represented in the individual expectations of the contracted personnel that align with those offers.
Another element of care, as far as career plans are concerned, is the limited visualization of growth and the rigid conception that usually characterizes it, since it obviates the ability that some people have to learn and assimilate concepts more quickly than others or whose personal and professional characteristics more quickly exceed the pre-established levels in planning, in addition to the fact that it is practically impossible to accurately project what will happen in five years with respect to the performance of a professional, it is enough to observe that both companies as the markets experience such a situation of uncertainty that it is already difficult to know how and where it will be in three years. Perhaps that thought was plausible when the past was an obligatory reference to project the future,which is completely wrong at present.
But as for the principle where career plans are based, referring to the development of the individual, there is no discussion whatsoever and that is why in a situation that demands flexibility and added value, succession plans arise as a more contemporary alternative that seeks keep this principle alive but adjusted to the prevailing reality.
Succession plans
According to the VOX dictionary of the Spanish Language, the word succession means, among other things, the "entry or continuation of a person or thing instead of another" and "prosecution, orderly continuation of people, things or events." And in a few words that is what should be understood by succession plans: the orderly and planned continuation of one person instead of another, with equal or superior characteristics.
However, the previous concept is confused, in most cases, with the concept of career plans and, some authors, tend to refer to both as synonyms, this being contrary to the truth.
Unlike career plans, whose planning is usually rigid and linear, succession plans do not foresee the professional growth or development of the employee based on years of permanence in a position or according to the academic levels obtained; Succession plans are based mainly on the map of developed or potential competencies of the individual and compare them with the maps corresponding to the different vacancies that may exist in any unit, the one that is closest immediately becomes the future successor regardless of what this if the candidate has three months or three years in the company.
This important difference is the one that separates career plans from succession plans, provided that the latter are based on competencies, otherwise it would be making the mistake of calling the same practice in two ways.
Furthermore, when we speak of an orderly and planned continuation as a concept of succession plans, it is not being given the traditional character of space and time, the order is given by the scheme, represented in the map of competencies, and planning is located on the premise that it is whoever has the talent who should occupy the position.
Succession plans are used by organizations whose organizational maturity and responsible order in the processes allow them to establish the map of their personnel's competencies from the moment they enter the company, constantly updating it, thus facilitating the possession of an almost instantaneous photograph of the Skills profile of its people, which translates into an important decision tool as it allows future managers of higher positions to be evaluated based on their talent and not on their curricular trajectory, as occurs in career plans.
Companies that use true succession plans are not looking for coincidences between positions or levels of training, their orientation is directed primarily to talent and the way in which it has been distributed in the skills map.
It is precisely this advantage that makes succession plans much more flexible and attractive, at the same time more demanding and successful than the old and different vision of career plans, while the latter emphasize seniority, certification and duration, succession plans address the intensity of experience, expertise, and developed or potential talent.
Succession plans are usually much more demanding than career plans because they require greater effort in the development of individual talent and its operationalization or implementation, in addition to the corresponding addition of value in an effective and measurable, efficient and palpable manner., inasmuch as it demands not only the handling of the information but also the updated and compared knowledge of it, as well as its translation to the current work environment.
While in the past the accumulation of time, academic levels or expertise accumulated points to move from one level to another, in a successor environment it is talent that prevails, which seems to recall that evolutionary phrase where survival is attributed to the fittest and not the oldest.
Another advantage that succession plans offer is the transfer of responsibility for the development of competencies to the employee and not to the company, who under this concept is more of a facilitator and advisor than responsible for it.
This means that the company offers all the mechanisms so that its employees can know the maps of existing or expected competencies for each position in the organization and compare them with their own, being they who decide which competency to develop to reach the hierarchical or knowledge level that they want in the company. Obviously, organizations provide the tools for the development of competence, guide those interested in it and align the expectations of those interested with those that the company has, making a planned and cost-conscious use.
In a scenario like the previous one, it is the employee and not the company who sets the goal, which can be achieved in a few months or several years, it only suffices that its map of competencies surpasses the closest one and adjusts in an appropriate percentage to the place that aspires, which cannot be translated under the same conditions to career plans.
However, the aforementioned cannot be understood as the absence of support and interest on the part of the organization regarding the training of its people, on the contrary, it is increased and magnified in a succession approach, because in the expectation of improving skills are the employees who demand training and this adjusts to the requirements previously established by the company in terms of the skills maps expected for the positions they hold.
However, it is normal that in the face of statements such as the above, doubts arise as to the merit of the employee who has spent years in the company and who deserves, due to his constancy, to be considered for a position of greater importance above any other worker with a seniority of less than yours. This is nothing more than the consequence of linear practice and rigid thinking inherited from the dominant managerial vision in past centuries. In the previous example, there are a series of questions worth answering before making value judgments. What has stunted that person's growth in recent years? How hard have you worked to develop your skills? How much value have you added to the company? When did you realize you were a candidate for that vacancy? Besides seniority, what other merits does it have?
Under the approach of career plans, every individual who accumulated the points corresponding to seniority automatically became a pre-candidate to be evaluated for a higher position. But in a scheme of succession plans, seniority is not ruled out but neither is it exclusive, the talent and effective knowledge that is possessed weighs more than time has remained in a position, since succession plans operationalize the concept present in the new selection paradigms.
The succession plans, observed under the concept presented here, are the evolution of the concept of career as a result of the development of the vision of competencies and the now called emotional intelligence; They give more importance to the person than to the plan itself and intend to value knowledge and its fruits above traditional schemes, therefore their concept must be rethought and differentiated from others that assume them as an extension of past practices.
For all the above, it can be noted that, without a doubt, these two management tools should be understood as two different practices but with a common root that is none other than the development and personal and professional growth of the individual within the organization, differentiated mainly in the flexibility or rigidity of its visualization, because while one is more orthodox and respects traditional management practices, the other, heterodox, challenges the linear concept and is oriented to give value to elements that demand more importance every day In today's demanding world, such as knowledge and talent, regardless of how and where it was obtained, as long as it can be transformed into a concrete fact and offers added value; the rest is just a question of paradigms.
