Webinar Recap: Inclusive Succession Planning — A Case Study of the LA Philharmonic
February 2, 2023 (Replay at end of page)
In 2022, ABA undertook an ambitious research project to determine what arts talent wants from their work as we emerge from the pandemic. As part of this research, we wrote a series of case studies of organizations that have made important progress on culture — which we are now sharing as a webinar series. You can find a recording and recap of our previous webinar exploring our case study of the Houston theater Stages here.
On February 2nd, we had the privilege of speaking with Emanuel Maxwell, Chief Talent and Equity Officer at the LA Philharmonic, about their particular approach to succession planning and how this enables a more inclusive culture.
The Compelling Offer
If you’re just joining our webinar journey, we previously shared our research on just how critical inclusive culture is to workers in the arts sector. We began with a question: “After two and a half years in the pandemic, what aspects of the job offer are most (and least) important to staff?” To answer this question, we employed a survey technique that’s typically used for product marketing called conjoint, or tradeoff analysis. Conjoint surveys ask people to choose between potential offers, for example: would you take a job with more pay, but fewer health benefits? A better manager but less flexible work? After you’ve made several choices, the computer begins to learn what you care about, and forces harder and harder tradeoffs until it learns how much more you care about some features than others.
This conjoint analysis allowed us to determine what people care about in absolute terms, as well as put a financial value on intangible workplace attributes and improvements by combining this ranking of what people value with how much money they would trade off to get it. We could then asses these factors as in the charts below, where the dollar value inside each pie slice represents the financial value of moving from “good” to “great” for that given attribute. From these charts, you can see that inclusive culture really matters.
But, what exactly is inclusive culture?
After determining how important inclusive culture is to staff, we set about understanding the academic and business literature on the subject, and developed the following framework.
Inclusive culture implies that everyone feels welcome, that they belong, that the organization values them enough to equip them with all the information they need and invest in them by finding opportunities across the organization for learning and growth, and the organization has put in place mechanisms to share power. In our Stages case study webinar, we focused on the “identity” columns. Today we will be focusing on “voice” – how to create opportunity and help people feel valued.
LA Philharmonic’s Proactive People Planning Process
Emanuel Maxwell joined the LA Philharmonic 18 months ago with vast experience outside the industry, coming from the corporate worlds of BP, Aramark, and ARCO. From this corporate experience, he brought significant learnings regarding succession planning, and implemented LA Phil’s current People Planning Process. This process has three stages: the Employee Snapshot, the 9 Box Grid, and the People Action Plan. You can access their performance review template here.
Employee Snapshot
This process begins with an annual employee snapshot conversation. Employees start the document by sharing their personal achievements, professional development activities, cross functional skills, and career aspirations. Managers finish the document with information from performance reviews including strengths, development areas, and next possible steps. The manager evaluates the staff member on performance and potential using the 9 Box Grid (more on that later). This simple document gives managers important information to help guide staff through careers, and also gives staff members the chance to highlight items their manager might otherwise not know about.
9 Box Grid
This framework, originally developed at GE by Jack Welch, plots performance against potential for each staff member. For individuals, in helps management assess how to reward a staff member today, and how to think about nurturing them for the future. For a full team, it reveals what a team leader needs to do to maintain progress against objectives.
For example, a leader may find that it’s “time for tough conversations,” when no one is quite meeting expectations, or time to groom a staff member more deliberately for leadership if no one looks poised to take over the next role. Counterintuitively, if everyone is high performing with high potential, leaders may still find a succession issue which would otherwise be difficult to identify. You must be creative in how you keep such staff engaged to keep them satiated in the roles they’re in, as there might not be immediate upward mobility opportunities for everyone.
People Action Plan
After each manager has had a conversation with staff and filled out the employee snapshot, including the 9 Box Grid and succession concerns, HR has a cascading series of conversations with each department. This begins with all managers, who go through key individuals on those teams and problem-solve together. Then the first level managers leave, and senior managers discuss the next level of staff, and so on. They prioritize individuals who occupy the bottom left of the 9 Box Grid and those who are high performers without a natural next role.
Discussion topics include team balance issues from the 9 Box Grid exercise, key person dependencies and solutions, employees needing pay adjustments or retention bonuses, opportunities to give staff a jump into a different department to build new skills, and progress of talent priorities such as diversity commitments. The output document for each individual discussed includes their rating followed by comments and several levels of successors.
Proactivity Pays Off
The LA Phil’s People Action Plan has delivered on many fronts. It offers:
Employee engagement: staff members know that managers are aware of their accomplishments and aspirations.
Sharper focus on talent and priorities: management make decisions about retention pay and opportunities, and can do so with a lens of priorities like diversity and equity.
A view of talent and strengths/opportunities.
Fewer surprises: retention risk is discussed annually, and stalled employees are a big part of the conversation.
Easier lateral movement: annual conversations reveal individuals who have unique skills and might be looking for a new home.
More thoughtful progression of staff in which the organization must invest the most – the high potential individuals.
Fairer pay increases.
In implementing the People Action Plan, there are a few factors to keep in mind:
First, deciding who to include in this process can be daunting. Emanuel recommends including managers and above by department, as well as who he calls “notable mentions,” those who are not leaders by title, but potential.
Second, one of the great advantages of this process is the shared responsibility between employee and manager. This helps manage dreams and expectations.
Finally, at the individual level everyone needs to understand what they do at their desk that contributes to what we put on stage. Start at the enterprise level: here are the goals we have this year. Then move to the department goals: managers, how do we support the enterprise goals? Then to the individual: how do we contribute to the department goals?
In Conversation with Emanuel Maxwell
Following the overview of the case study, we held an open Q&A session with Emanuel. Below are some highlights from our conversation.
Values-First
On taking up this new position, Katie had an idea of the progress that needed to be made around culture and “connectiveness.” They were tremendously aided by their leadership, who are incredibly values-driven. They trickle down and permeate these values through every layer of the organization by truly leaning in to those values at every meeting and asking – how does this contribute to our values?
What observations do you have coming from outside the industry?
Coming from outside the industry, those working within share an inordinate amount of passion for the organization, in a manner you rarely see in the corporate world. Outside of the industry, employees do not share the same sense of allegiance to their organization as you see at the LA Phil.
Secondly, managers often wonder how they can talk about their people. Do not think of this as a negative conversation; think instead of talking about your people like you’re a sports agent, and you’re talking about your athletes. You’re taking care of each other.
How can this apply beyond staff to people from outside the organization?
When bringing in candidates from outside the organization, the 9 Box Grid can still be of service. Using it to analyze the dynamics of the existing team, we can see how this candidate would complement the team and what type of candidate needs to be brought in, remembering that not every member needs to be upwardly ambitious.
Can this process be applied to non-profit board members?
There are elements of this process that can be helpful in viewing boards; however, the LA Phil uses a separate process that looks more at the goals of the enterprise, and what each board member is doing to contribute to those.
How do you manage a leader who is unwilling to share or delegate responsibility?
This process highlights those “bottleneck managers” by shining a light on those unsung heroes among the staff through the shared snapshots in the cascading meetings.
Can this process be applied to smaller organizations?
Absolutely. It is very useful to do the employee snapshot, even if you cannot use every part of the tool. This allows you to learn what individuals have previously accomplished and create aspirations.
Any final advice?
Communicate to individuals that this process is for you; however, there should be no expectation that this process ends in promotion. Also, be sure that this entire process always ends in a debrief for the individuals.
What’s Next?
The Advisory Board for the arts hosted one more webinar showcasing an organization that has addressed challenges associated with “moving toward the right” on the inclusion framework above.
We examined the McCarter Theatre’s clever use of User Guides, “operating manuals” that individuals write about themselves to help colleagues interact with them more effectively. These guides have been shown to increase the psychological safety needed to reach higher levels of performance.
These case studies bring to life efforts of arts organizations to move beyond traditional interpretations of inclusion to foster an inclusive culture truly worthy of employee expectations.