Improving Internal Mobility Through Position Management
In order for organizations to meet their strategic initiatives and be resilient in the face of challenges, they need the right people, in the right positions, at the right time. Having the right people often requires recruiting from outside the organization, but when possible, promoting from within offers real advantages. Internal mobility represents a key strategy that modern organizations can and should invest in. And with all the headwinds organizations face today, it’s more important than ever to improve internal mobility.
What is internal mobility?
Internal mobility refers to the movement of people from one position to another within an organization, and includes both upward promotions along a defined career ladder, as well as lateral moves across alternative career ladders. Through a focus on internal mobility, organizations can better utilize their existing talent, increase employee engagement and productivity, reduce turnover and hiring costs, and retain valuable knowledge.
What is position management?
Position management(link) is the process of planning, managing, and reporting on the positions within an organization, regardless of whether the positions are filled or open. Position management requires that an organizational structure be built upon a robust, position-centric data model. Most HR tools, however, are based upon employees as the fundamental unit of data. People join an organization, move through various positions, and eventually leave—but positions exist before, during, and after the employee lifecycle. Therefore, positions are truly fundamental to the organization's structure.
How do internal mobility and position management relate?
Internal mobility is all about the movement of people from one position to another within the same organization. So, accurately tracking and improving this movement requires a reliable source of position data. Because position management provides a robust, position-based data model from which an organization can operate, it’s the ideal framework upon which to base all internal mobility initiatives. Through position management, an organization can easily and accurately track all movement of people and positions, providing the ideal way to measure internal mobility. The better the organization is at position management, the more easily the organization will be able to track and improve internal mobility.
How can position management help improve internal mobility?
Organizations aiming to improve their internal mobility should first establish their position management processes and tools. Once position management is in place, the following steps outline the industry best practices:
1. Establish the baseline
Before rolling out any new internal mobility initiatives, it’s important to first establish a baseline. Doing this will allow you to accurately measure the impact of your initiatives. If your organization currently does position management in a spreadsheet, setting this baseline will require quite a bit of manual work. You’ll have to devise a way to accurately track all changes as people in your organization change positions.
2. Implement new initiatives
With a baseline established, begin implementing your new internal mobility initiatives, which may include ensuring employees know about all job openings, providing all employees with a way to explore their own career paths through career ladders and job definitions, and implementing a succession planning strategy.
3. Measure the impact
Over a predetermined time period, measure your internal mobility to assess the efficacy of your new initiatives. Track metrics such as promotions from within vs hiring externally, pipeline utilization for succession and talent pools, and the paths showing where people in a current job came from, and where they go after leaving the job. Using a dedicated position management system with integrated tools for internal mobility, succession planning, and career pathing can significantly improve your ability to measure impact.
4. Identify areas for improvement and iterate again
As you compare your current stats to your baseline, you’ll begin to get a sense for how well your initiatives are working. You may find that internal mobility has improved in some areas of your organization more than in others, which can be an indication that your initiatives do work, but that some groups or leaders have more readily adopted them than others. Once you identify areas for improvement and make the necessary changes, continue tracking and refining your internal mobility initiatives.
What tools do I need?
It’s helpful to first audit the tools you already have today. Spreadsheets and other manual tools can work well enough for a while, but most organizations outgrow these basic tools and find greater value from industry-leading platforms like Built. If improving internal mobility is a key initiative for your organization, please schedule a brief discovery call with our team and we’ll help you assess your current tools and processes, as well as identify ways you can improve.
