Make a Progression or Talent Decision

Flow · 7 controlled steps

1. 01

   Frame the decision and authority

   Define exactly what is being decided and what remains outside this process.

   • — Classify the decision as expanded scope, level progression, lateral move, readiness designation, succession consideration, assignment, continued development, or no change.
   • — Name the decision owner, target work, timing, constraints, available outcomes, required consultation, and downstream authorities.
   • — Clarify whether an approved opportunity exists or only a readiness decision is possible.
   • — State what the decision does not promise about role, timing, pay, succession, or continued employment.

   Responsible

   Talent-process owner

   Output

   Talent Decision Charter

   Decision

   Is there a legitimate, sufficiently defined talent decision to make?

2. 02

   Define the target work and evidence standard

   Assess against actual future work rather than a title, person prototype, or vague potential.

   • — Confirm target purpose, outcomes, scope, complexity, authority, interfaces, context, essential capabilities, and operating conditions.
   • — Define readiness evidence, acceptable uncertainty, learning curve, support assumptions, and qualified-work gates.
   • — Distinguish requirements at entry from capabilities that can responsibly develop after movement.
   • — Check that comparable candidates will be assessed against the same material standard.

   Responsible

   Target-work owner

   Output

   Talent Evidence Standard

   Decision

   Is the target standard job-related, proportionate, and usable for this decision?

3. 03

   Assemble permitted evidence and aspiration

   Create a complete decision record without importing irrelevant history or private information.

   • — Collect authorized contribution reviews, development dispositions, work evidence, capability demonstrations, experience, and relevant qualifications.
   • — Invite the role holder’s aspiration, constraints, mobility preferences, timing, and interest without assuming availability or consent.
   • — Document opportunity and support previously provided, changed context, and evidence gaps.
   • — Exclude protected, personal, hearsay, popularity, sponsorship, or other information not permitted by the method.

   Responsible

   Talent-process owner

   Output

   Talent Evidence Record

   Decision

   Is the evidence sufficient, current, relevant, and fairly obtainable?

4. 04

   Assess readiness and transition risk

   Judge the evidence against target work while preserving uncertainty and development possibilities.

   • — Evaluate each material target outcome and capability using the approved evidence standard.
   • — Distinguish demonstrated readiness, transferable evidence, learnable gaps, unsupported assumptions, and disqualifying gaps.
   • — Assess transition support, workload, backfill, team, customer, safety, quality, and continuity effects.
   • — Record alternative moves or continued-development paths where they better fit evidence and aspiration.

   Responsible

   Target-work owner

   Output

   Draft Readiness Assessment

   Decision

   What readiness state is supported for the defined target and conditions?

5. 05

   Calibrate candidates and options

   Test consistency and organizational effects without reducing people to a grid.

   • — Compare evidence standards, reasoning, opportunity histories, conditions, uncertainty, and proposed outcomes across relevant cases.
   • — Challenge similarity, visibility, sponsorship, pedigree, tenure, recency, replacement difficulty, and manager-hoarding effects.
   • — Review unexplained patterns and access to opportunity with qualified support.
   • — Assess organization capacity, succession risk, movement dependencies, and alternative paths without forced ranking or distribution.

   Responsible

   Talent decision owner

   Output

   Calibrated Talent Options

   Decision

   Are proposed decisions consistent, evidence-based, and operationally coherent?

6. 06

   Decide and authorize the talent outcome

   Make one explicit decision while preserving downstream authorities.

   • — Choose the authorized outcome, conditions, timing, validity period, risks, and fallback.
   • — Document evidence, tradeoffs, uncertainty, dissent, and why alternatives were not chosen.
   • — Separate readiness from availability and separate this decision from compensation, formal role change, assignment, offer, or board approval.
   • — Approve the exact decision record and minimum necessary downstream disclosures.

   Responsible

   Talent decision owner

   Output

   Authorized Talent Decision

   Decision

   Which outcome best matches the target work, evidence, aspiration, organization need, and acceptable risk?

7. 07

   Communicate, route, and review

   Turn the decision into a clear next state without informal promises or silent shelving.

   • — Explain the decision, relevant evidence, conditions, uncertainty, timing, what it does not decide, and the response route.
   • — Record acknowledgement, factual correction, material disagreement, aspiration change, and permitted response.
   • — Route approved role or assignment implementation, compensation review, development, outcome alignment, backfill, or succession actions to their owners.
   • — Review movement outcomes, opportunity access, decision quality, retention, exceptions, and guardrails at the defined point.

   Responsible

   Talent-process owner

   Output

   Acknowledged Talent Decision · Talent Decision Handoffs · Decision Review Trigger

   Decision

   Have the person and receiving owners accepted a clear, controlled next state?

Connections

Seams · 16 hops within 2 steps

Upstream and downstream neighbourhood over public reference processes only. Each hop shows the trigger, carried objects, and what the receiving process loses if the producing step is skipped.

Roles

Systems + Data

Measures

Evidence + judgment

Draft reference standard. Requires client context and qualified employment, labor, accessibility, privacy, safety, quality, credentialing, compensation, board or fiduciary, ethics, regulatory, and jurisdiction-specific review before deployment.