Succession Planning: Part II

Despite acknowledging the importance CEO succession, new research on U.S. organizations has found that a remarkable proportion have failed to put succession plans in place, an oversight that is symptomatic of a more widespread failures in talent management and leadership development.

According to this article from Management-Issues, around half the boards of public, private and nonprofit corporations consider their efforts around CEO succession to be less-than effective and a similar proportion admit they have no succession plan in place.

The findings emerged from a series of surveys published by The National Association of Corporate Director's (NACD) research arm, The Center for Board Leadership, in collaboration with Mercer Delta Consulting.

Their findings:

• A quarter of organizations acknowledge that their boards fall into "below acceptable" levels of CEO succession planning, despite directors identifying succession as among the leading concerns facing their companies.
• For directors on public boards, CEO succession is the second-most critical board concern, up from last year's third, while for directors on private boards, it ranks as the third-most important issue, up from fifth last year.
• Strategic planning and corporate performance were other issues high on the agenda for boards in 2006.