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An independent assessment identifies opportunities to strengthen succession planning practices and support long-term workforce continuity.
Background
A Southern California public agency that provides wastewater services for millions of residents identified talent acquisition, talent retention, and succession planning as key organizational risks through its enterprise risk management process. Recognizing the importance of maintaining institutional knowledge and operational continuity, agency leadership engaged MGO to assess its human capital management and workforce succession planning practices.
Challenge
Like many state and local government organizations, the agency faced increasing workforce pressures driven by retirement eligibility, competition for talent, and the need to develop future leaders. To prepare for future workforce transitions, leadership needed a comprehensive understanding of its succession planning practices across the organization.
Approach
MGO performed an organization-wide assessment of succession planning practices with a focus on evaluating governance, process frameworks, and department implementation.
The engagement included:
- Reviewing succession planning governance structures, policies, and accountability mechanisms
- Evaluating the agency’s workforce planning framework and alignment with strategic objectives
- Conducting interviews with human resources leadership and members of the executive leadership team
- Assessing succession planning documentation and departmental implementation practices
- Evaluating HR practices that support succession planning — including candidate pipeline development, recruitment processes, onboarding practices, performance management structures, employee development and training programs, and exit procedures
- Identifying strengths, gaps, and opportunities to improve consistency across the organization
Value to Client
MGO’s assessment found the agency had established a strong foundation for succession planning with consistent organization-wide leadership support, HR processes to provide clear guidance, and department leadership prioritization. With effective implementation among the operations-focused departments, the primary opportunity for improvement centered on achieving more consistent implementation across all departments.
MGO provided practical recommendations designed to strengthen execution while building upon the existing framework. Recommendations focused on:
- Expanding observed best practices to all departments for consistent succession planning implementation
- Improving workforce planning documentation and accountability
- Strengthening talent development training for emerging leaders
- Supporting long-term knowledge transfer and continuity planning
These recommendations provide the agency with a practical roadmap to advance workforce planning goals, maintain operational resilience, and prepare future leaders to meet evolving service demands.
Plan for Tomorrow’s Workforce Today
Preparing tomorrow’s workforce starts with understanding how your succession planning efforts are working today. MGO’s state and local government consulting professionals can help you evaluate workforce planning practices and develop practical strategies for long-term organizational resilience.
The content of this article is intended to provide a general guide to the subject matter. Specialist advice should be sought about your specific circumstances.
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