The City of Moose Jaw has won a national award for its succession planning project that it started four years and sees senior managers mentor up-and-coming younger employees.
The Canadian Association of Municipal Administrators (CAMA) announced on May 11 during a virtual ceremony that Moose Jaw had received the 2021 CAMA Professional Development Award in the 20,001 to 100,000 population category. This award recognizes a community that has developed a unique and innovative program for its staff and can be replicated in other communities.
CAMA pointed out that many employees in senior leadership at city hall are approaching retirement, so the municipality rose to the challenge to start preparing staff to take on those roles.
This is the first time the City of Moose Jaw has won this award.
“I’m excited. It’s our peers (who judged us). It’s all the cities across Canada that are in these competitions and applying for awards … ,” city manager Jim Puffalt said during an online media scrum on May 12. “It shows that what we do is innovative and rises to the top and is something that other people will be talking about how they can emulate.”
Winning a national award is a “really big deal,” said Al Bromley, director of human resources and the architect of the initiative. This is the single-biggest honour of which he’s been a part during his career with the city. The team at city hall is pleased with this recognition.
This plan has become important to the culture at city hall since it allows management to find that next level of talent to fill roles, said Puffalt. A municipality needs to have that corporate history to share with its next level of managers.
The succession planning initiative began in 2017 after management realized it had no plan for succession planning or career development, Bromley explained. A chance webinar with author Michael Timms led to steps to develop the program; Timms was brought in to help train managers in succession planning, delegating and career coaching.
City administration later had 60 employees participate in focus groups and help refine the plan’s pillars of leadership excellence, four criteria that focused on what defines a leader. Administration then rolled out the program in June 2017 and pitched the initiative to employees throughout the city.
Senior managers also identified 12 critical positions that needed to be addressed for the future and the need to determine and recruit internal candidates quickly.
There are currently 21 career coaches mentoring 56 career owners who have enrolled in the succession planning program, Bromley said. Of 14 career owners nominated for critical positions, two have advanced to those roles in the past year: Bevan Harlton, who is now the director of engineering services, and Darrin Stephanson, who is now the director of public works and utilities.
The municipality has also supported career owners in their development plans, from one-off courses to workshops, online training, and furthering their post-secondary education.
Although there is no age by which people must retire, the leadership team has several people who have extensive experience and are approaching retirement, said Bromley. The senior leadership team determined four years ago that by 2022, one-quarter of staff in most departments would retire, including some senior staff.
“My colleagues … really look for opportunities to do things differently (and) to produce different results,” he added. “Our team are quite willing to make personal sacrifices for the greater good of the community and our organization.”
