Succession Planning: Barriers and Solutions
Luke Kuepfer • July 3, 2020
Leaders face a number of barriers and challenges to overcome when planning for a successor:
- For leaders to give up ownership of the vision and mission they carried for years is not easy. With great investment naturally comes a great sense of ownership. Serving leaders must recognize that they are only stewards of God’s Kingdom for a season.
- For many leaders, their identity is wrapped up in their positions. Serving leaders, however, recognize that their calling in life is greater than their temporary positions. Their ultimate call is to develop others. Therefore they gain by giving up, letting go of a “limited” position to lead multiple leaders through ongoing coaching and mentoring.
- Timing is one of the crucial issues in an organizational transition. Leaders must discern the balance between handing off the baton too quickly and holding on too long. Either can cripple an organization for years to come.
- As leaders pass on the baton they may be challenged with a concern for ongoing financial security. Serving leaders see this as an opportunity to grow in their faith and pursue other options for supplying their needs.
- Lastly, resistance to change for both the leader and the members of an organization can present a real challenge. Leaders must clarify the organizational vision, stress long-term gains over short-term discomforts, and declare their own dispensability while affirming confidence in the new leader.
[Next week we will discuss selecting and preparing a successor.]
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Organizations allow individuals to work together to accomplish things that they could not accomplish by themselves.
God wants each of us and the organizations we lead to always strive to do everything in an excellent and effective manner.
A long-range (strategic) plan serves as a “road map” to help us achieve the mission and vision that God has given us.
Leaders who develop followers grow their organization only one person at a time. But leaders who develop leaders multiply their growth.
A leader that leads, loves, and serves like Jesus must learn to use their power and influence to serve others and accomplish the mission God has given them.
Wisdom can be defined as having experience, knowledge, and good judgment. Wisdom is that character trait that enables one to live an exceptional life.
Decisions reveal the values of a leader and require obedience and dependence on God. They demand wisdom. Making decisions affects just about everything leaders do.
It is one thing for a leader to have a vision; it is quite another thing to be able to effectively communicate that vision to others so that they will embrace and internalize it.
Godly leaders must first have a vision of who God is, the future He holds for them, and a sense of what He has called them to do.
