DDBA 8582 Week 7 Internal Redeployment Process Example

From a Need Appearing to a Person Working at Speed: A Redeployment Process for the Insurer Timed Stage by Stage Against a 120-Day Scenario Window, With the Manager's Release Redesigned Because It Consumes the Most Time

Student Name

Walden University

DDBA 8582: An HR Plan for Organizational Agility

Instructor Name

Month Day, Year

From a Need Appearing to a Person Working at Speed: A Redeployment Process for the Insurer Timed Stage by Stage Against a 120-Day Scenario Window, With the Manager's Release Redesigned Because It Consumes the Most Time

Where the Clock Starts and Stops

Scenario C in Week 2 asks the composite Iowa insurer to move about 40 people from a shrinking Medicare supplement unit to group administration within 120 days. The clock starts when the group administration director identifies a staffing need and stops when the redeployed person processes work at the unit's standard rate.

The Current Process

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At 136 days, the current process misses the 120-day window by more than two weeks, and the release stage consumes a quarter of the time.

Table 1

Redeployment Stages, Current Times and Owners

Why Release Takes So Long

Interviews with four managers who delayed releases gave the same reason: releasing a capable person before a replacement arrives leaves their own unit short, and nothing rewards them for releasing quickly. Doeringer and Piore (1971) described internal labor markets as governed by administrative rules and customs rather than prices, and those rules shape how quickly people move. At the insurer, the rule is that a transfer requires the losing manager's agreement, with no deadline. Keller (2018) studied internal hiring and found that when managers slot people into jobs directly rather than through open posting, hiring outcomes differ, which shows that the procedures governing internal moves affect who moves and how well they fit.

The Redesign

The redesigned release stage sets a ten-working-day deadline, about 14 calendar days, for any redeployment approved under a declared scenario, after which the transfer proceeds automatically. To address the cause, the losing unit receives priority for backfill, and managers' scorecards credit the number of people they develop and release. Pay and grade, which took 14 days, can run in parallel with release, since the grade for the shared core roles is set in advance by the Week 4 design.

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Table 2

Redesigned Process Times

Does It Meet the Window?

At 96 days, the redesigned process fits within 120 with three weeks to spare. Bidwell (2011) found that internal movers outperformed external hires in their early years, which supports investing in internal redeployment rather than hiring for the growing unit.

What the Redesign Asks of Managers

Managers lose the ability to delay a release, which many use to protect their units' service levels. The redesign responds in three ways. Backfill priority means the losing unit's open position moves to the front of the recruiting queue. The scorecard credit recognizes managers who develop and release people, so that losing a strong performer counts as a contribution rather than a loss. And the deadline applies only under a declared scenario, not to every transfer request, so ordinary moves still need the manager's agreement. Whether these offsets are enough will be tested in the resistance analysis.

Shortening the Longest Stage

Ramp-up takes 42 days because redeployed staff learn the receiving unit's work only after arriving. If the shared core and one module were taught before any scenario, a redeployed person would arrive already trained, and the ramp could fall to about three weeks.

Testing the Process

The insurer can test the redesigned process before a scenario arrives by running one planned redeployment, timing each stage and comparing it with the targets.

Who Declares a Scenario

The chief operating officer declares a scenario, using the trigger from Week 9, so the deadline cannot be invoked casually for ordinary transfers.

Pilot

One planned move in the coming quarter will test the redesigned stages and their owners.

Limits

The ramp-to-speed stage, the longest, is unchanged; shortening it would require the shared core training to happen before a scenario arrives.

References

Bidwell, M. (2011). Paying more to get less: The effects of external hiring versus internal mobility. Administrative Science Quarterly, 56(3), 369-407. https://doi.org/10.1177/0001839211433562

Doeringer, P. B., & Piore, M. J. (1971). Internal labor markets and manpower analysis. Heath Lexington Books.

Keller, J. R. (2018). Posting and slotting: How hiring processes shape the quality of hire and compensation in internal labor markets. Administrative Science Quarterly, 63(4), 848-878. https://doi.org/10.1177/0001839217736045