20 April The Succession Decision (...undo...)

[Paul Terlemezian]

In brief - Drucker's advice is to anticipate future challenges and find someone that has already demonstrated their success in handling those challenges elsewhere.

 

He recommends avoiding:

 

1. A carbon copy of the previous jobholder

2. The faithful assistant to the incumbent

3. The anointed prince

 

In this era of knowledge work where we require people that have the ability to quickly assess a situation, acquire the knowledge that is needed and then apply it successfully we also need to train differently.

 

Rather than train people to perform exactly like yesterday's best performers or to promote those that served as apprentices I wonder if we need to treat every job as if it were a brand new position focused only on the future.

 

From the earliest days of my career I can recall the experienced specialists eagerly talking to new hires not only to impart their experience but to stay current on new ways of solving old problems.

 

Our experiences are valuable but they can also be "baggage." Keep looking forward and prepare to solve the problems that have not occurred yet instead of being focused on being efficient about yesterday.

[Paul Terlemezian]

Years ago I learned that the most common use of coaches in large corporations was to support a senior executive who was newly hired to have strategic responsibility and yet had limited or no tactical experience.

How could this make good sense - both the coach and the hiring decision?