Do you have a 5 year strategy for your business? 10 year? what about a generational strategy?

Simply put, your succession plan is a generational strategy to pass the knowledge, people and your wealth to the following generations (or whomever the beneficiaries of your hard work will be). You have spent much energy in strategy planning; yet oftentimes, less effort is spent on the equally important planning around succession.

What to do?

You have to consider
1. do you need a chief succession officer
2. what are the measures of achievement for this person
3. what authority will this person have?
4. how often do you wish reports and check-ins with this person
5. who will be your chief succession officer? Is it to be a trusted advisor? you? or a family member?

Succession is something that is important for a family and its family enterprise and yet succession difficult to measure the steps along the succession plan. Why? Each family is unique and there is often no specific roadmap from beginning to end of your succession plan.

How to move this initiative forward?
– seek outside advice from a trusted and experienced succession advisor
– think about how you would measure the steps along your succession plan
– appoint a chief succession officer

This is a challenging and yet very rewarding endeavour, a matter all families in business should consider starting.

Learn, think, apply!