I got a call from an attorney the other day, asking for help with one of his clients.

The client would like to retire, travel the world, and dedicate himself to his philanthropic foundation, but, according to him, “everyone in the company is young and incapable.”

Sadly, I hear this a lot. Many CEOs will say they have no one capable of being promoted.

• The market is tight.
• Good leaders are hard to find.
• Younger employees aren’t ready.
• No one wants the responsibility.

Pick your version.

Blaming the talent market is understandable. It’s external. It’s convenient. And it shifts the responsibility somewhere else.

But the issue honestly isn’t people — it’s the absence of a system that actually prepares your future leaders.

If your succession plan only works as long as certain people don’t leave, it’s not a plan — it’s a hope strategy.

The Root of the Problem

Succession planning is too often treated like a one-time event instead of a long-term system. When a key leader announces a retirement or departure, everyone scrambles. Gaps suddenly become visible — and the conclusion is almost always the same: we don’t have anyone ready.

What’s missing from that conclusion is an honest look in the mirror.

How often have you seen (or have you done yourself) technical expertise, tenure, and reliability are rewarded, while asking people to “level up” is delayed or avoided altogether. High performers become indispensable in their current roles, not deliberately stretched for future ones.

Over time, this creates a leadership pipeline that is deep in functional expertise but narrow in perspective. Leaders know their lane well, but they haven’t been asked to think across the business. They haven’t owned decisions with enterprise-wide consequences. They haven’t led through ambiguity, conflict, or complexity.

When a senior role opens, the step up is enormous — for them and for the organization.

That’s not a talent shortage. That’s a development failure.

If readiness is described in vague terms — “not quite there yet,” “needs more seasoning,” “has potential” — it’s because readiness was never clearly defined in the first place. Without a shared definition of what future leaders need to know and experience about the organization as a whole, development is inconsistent which not only makes people unprepared for their next role, but also leads to a chaos when you elevate haphazardly “trained” executives (should you default to promoting from within).

A Better Way

Organizations with strong succession benches do something fundamentally different. They don’t wait for roles to open before developing leaders. They intentionally create exposure. They rotate responsibility. They assign stretch work with real stakes. They allow emerging leaders to make decisions — and live with the outcomes — while support still exists. (This last part is important, read it again.)

Most importantly, they treat leadership readiness as a business system.

What started out as a people problem quickly becomes an operational and financial one.

The question needs to change from “Who could replace them?”
to “How are we deliberately preparing leaders to step into greater complexity?”

When succession planning is reframed as a development system — with clear expectations, intentional experiences, and ongoing review — the talent conversation changes. Gaps shrink. Confidence grows. Promotions are confident – on both sides of the equation.

Because most succession failures aren’t caused by a lack of talent.
They’re caused by a systemic lack of preparation.

 

 

By Nanette Miner, Ed.D.

Keywords: Entrepreneurship, HR, Leadership

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