Submitted by Kitty Schainman, Catlin Gabel School
This piece originally appeared in the article "Filling the Leadership Pipeline" in the January/February 2017 Net Assets.
Our school, Catlin Gable, is going to be facing the double impact of key financial officers and facilities personnel retiring in the next few years. We will be missing their collective 60-plus years of experience with our institution. While the loss of their experience and knowledge will be sorely missed, my greater concern is two-fold: the loss of solid working relationships and the dearth of skilled middle-career managers and technicians to fill the voids. Regrowing relationships and training-up novices takes an investment in time and resources. It also puts a greater burden on those who aren’t retiring.
We are moving forward proactively to glean as much insight and institutional knowledge as possible from these folks now. Annual staff reviews will now include maintaining an annual calendar of planning and tasks related to each job. Not work orders or preventive maintenance, but the seasonal planning and thought processes that have become habit over the years.
We are also attempting to get funding into our operations budget to cover the huge expenses that come when an established person is succeeded by a new employee: professional training, licensing and, most importantly, planned months of overlap with the replacement person. As a small school (750 students but 32 buildings and 60-plus acres), we rely so much on individual specialists (one HVAC, one mechanic, one electrician) because we have little redundancy. I am adamant that to ensure a successful transition and a seamless transfer of knowledge, we have to have a lengthy training and vetting period. We must make sure we have the right replacement before the veteran retires. Several times we have hired a person who became overwhelmed, disenchanted or lured away. This left us with no knowledge transfer at all and a much longer and more costly recovery time.
Wish me luck, and put out the word that there is great value in investing in the people who manage the school’s physical and financial health.
