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Succession planning needs to be modified if it is to remain a relevant means of regenerating a company's leadership. There are several causes of the gap between the promises of traditional succession planning and what is delivered. The most important goal is developing strong leadership teams for strategic tasks. The means of doing this lies in succession management, which offers a more flexible and dynamic approach for developing strong leadership teams.
In a world where Marriott is re-examining the notion of leisure when instantaneous communication and telecommuting can bring the office to the beach and the Marlborough Man is riding the cigarette market to new heights in Eastern Europe, the assumptions that guided succession planning have changed. No longer is succession planning grounded in organizational stability, where straight line projections, static structures, and heirs apparent once prevailed. Whether it's the mega-mergers of Disney and Capital Cities/ABC, the corporate splits of AT&T, Lucent Technologies, and NCR, the consolidation of defense contractors or the pressures of globalized competition, change - the ever-increasing rate of change - characterizes the day.
Witness the parade of CEOs who have been casualties of this dramatic change: Akers at IBM, Antonini at K-Mart, Bondi at Viacom, Fuchs at HBO, Robinson at American Express, Spindler at Apple, and the list goes on and on. And with the new CEO comes new senior managers. At IBM, for example, Gerstner, chosen from outside the company, structured his executive management committee to blend seasoned IBM executives with outsiders. Even where the CEO comes up through the ranks, there is a greater propensity to look outside the company for senior managerial talent. Within AT&T where technology, not telephones, more aptly describes the company, one-half of the executive team were recruited from outside the company. With the discontinuities of the business environment come the discontinuities in executive succession planning.
Changing societal expectations also contribute to the accelerated changes in the business landscape. The workplace is increasingly diverse, characterized by more women, minorities, ethnicities, and age groups, as well as men and women seeking to balance the demands of family and work. Within the global context, diversity takes on added dimensions. A consequence is that corporations are re-thinking how their leadership development efforts should address these issues.
Corporations have...