Varia Ranah - Sorotan Ilmiah Perkhidmatan Awam

340 Varia Ranah: Sorotan Ilmiah Perkhidmatan Awam advancement. This has led to a further shrink towards the talent pool from which JPA may draft up for the public service leadership succession process. Overall, most leadership succession programs assist in managing the organization’s direction. Any succession event at the higher management level, planned or unplanned, tends to lead to changes in the composition of management found in the system (Wiersema, 1995), as well as the composition of the higher management committee (Ward et. al., 1999). Changes at this level have been shown to affect the implementation of the organization’s strategic vision (Hambrick, Cho and Chen, 1996; Dooley and Fryxell, 1999) and the achievement of long-term performance goals (Virany, Tushman and Romanelli, 1992). To address the strategic direction requirement, a leadership succession program must ensure that candidates are available to lead the organization in the intended direction (Cannella and Shen, 2001; Shen and Cannella, 2002). OBSERVATIONS Definitively, leadership succession programs should be developed to assist in maintaining the confidence of stakeholders, as higher management succession events are often viewed by stakeholders as a signal of either good or poor management at the higher management committee level. Stakeholders tend to react positively to the ascension of the heir apparent to the higher management’s position (Shen and Cannella, 2003) and to embark an initiated and smoothly executed successions (Sridharan and St John, 1998; Furtado and Rozeff, 1987; Freidman and Singh, 1989). On the other hand, Shen and Cannella (2003) recorded negative stakeholder reactions when heirs apparent exited organizations. To address the stakeholder perception imperative, a leadership succession program must ensure smooth identification, preparation, retention and ultimately the installation of a new higher management personnel.