The New York Division of Retirement Services (DRS) supports and operates one of the largest pension and benefits programs in the nation, with millions of beneficiaries. A management audit surfaced substantial risk, due to the fragmented systems and processes, AND the pending swell of baby-boomer retirements of key employees from within every department, and at every level.
We facilitated a cross-functional team to design and execute a detailed risk assessment, specify and prioritize needed near-term improvements in processes, systems and talent management, and carry out a comprehensive knowledge-capture and management strategy for DRS. This effort was expected to feed into a complementary large-scale systems overhaul—enabling new information management capabilities to support the effort.
Executive management agreed to key recommendations, and put the strategy into practice over 18 months, while the systems implementation has progressed. This unit has been identified as a “leader” in addressing these key talent-departure risks among New York State government agencies.