What do you do if performance evaluations reveal employees' potential for leadership roles?

Identify employees with leadership potential based on performance evaluations, then offer tailored feedback and development pathways, including training and stretch assignments, to nurture their skills and establish a succession plan, thus building a robust pipeline of future leaders for the organization.

When performance reviews reveal hidden gems in your team, it's like finding out your quiet coworker is secretly a karaoke superstar. ??? Here's what one can do: Shine the spotlight on them! Provide opportunities for growth, mentorship, and let them lead a project or two. Who knows? They might just be the next big hit in the leadership charts. Remember, every great leader once had a first act. Let's nurture those talents and watch them take the stage! ??

Start with a conversation with the employee. What do they want for their future? While you may have identified their potential for leadership, is it their desire? If their answer is yes, then work together to find a pathway to increase their abilities and learn new skills. Let them take on a few challenges and stretch assignments. Find training, either in house or from an outside source to add to their repertoire. If the answer is they are not interested, tell them that the door is open to more discussion if and when they want to revisit the conversation. DO NOT push a "good" employee into a role they do not want. You will end up losing not only a future leader, but quite possible a good employee.

Delegate leadership responsibilities and projects to employees with leadership potential. Give them opportunities to lead teams, spearhead initiatives, and take on additional responsibilities to develop their leadership skills in a practical setting. Develop a succession plan to identify potential candidates for future leadership positions and outline a roadmap for their development and advancement within the organization.

Identifying employees with potential for leadership roles through performance evaluations is a valuable opportunity for organizational growth. Once these individuals are identified, providing them with tasks and projects to assess their leadership abilities is a strategic approach. Assigning tasks and projects allows these employees to demonstrate their skills and capabilities in practical scenarios. It provides them with opportunities to showcase their decision-making abilities, problem-solving skills, communication effectiveness, and capacity for teamwork and collaboration.

For example, when we discovered that our junior developer, Shyam, had a knack for rallying the troops, we didn't just give them a pat on the back. We threw them into the deep end (with a life jacket, of course) by assigning them to lead a critical project. The result? A standing ovation from the team and a project delivered ahead of schedule. Moral of the story: When you spot potential, don't just nod appreciatively. Act on it! Your team's hidden talents could be the opening act to an amazing leadership career. ??

All recommendations are great. However, in my view the first thing you would need to do is have a Development Conversation with the employee. It's always exciting to learn that you have someone with a talent that is not so common, and you may be immediately leaning towards advancing this talent by providing training, new projects, stretch responsibilities, etc. But the first thing you need to understand is what's going on in his/her mind. How they see themselves in the short and mid-term future, what are their aspirations and personal goals. Then, and only then, will you be able to design an effective career development plan for the talent.

In addition to listing down the traits, offering feedback etc providing the candidates with opportunities such as stretch assignments, handling key projects in addition to his / her current responsibility etc would help him/ her improve not only on the functional competencies. Offering mentorship would play a key role in preparing the employee with high potential for future roles. Help the employee list down his learning goals for the next 6 - 12 months and facilitate them to arrive at a roadmap towards accomplishing these goals.

Everything depends on the organizational promotion culture. - If the organization is open to promotion = speak with employees' superior on options + look for already budgeted vacancies across an organization that would fit employees' career aspirations. Make a plan, gain commitment from involved parties, and then communicate the plan, options, and obligations to the employee - if the organization is not open to promotion (apart from what is written in PR publications) - agree with the manager how to proceed in order to retain employee but not to promote. Usually, this is the endless cycle of trainings, seminars, business trips... everything made for the employee to feel important and appreciated. But not promoted.