SUCCESSION PLANNING

BBS can assist you to make sure your company survives for a long time after you have successfully retired or if something should happen to you or other leaders in the company. Succession planning can be a tedious and complex process when trying to identify and develop the right employees with the potential to fill key business leadership positions in the company. But correct and appropriate succession planning provides for the continuity of your business and increases the availability of experienced and capable employees that are prepared to assume important roles in your company should they become available due to retirement or vacancy. Often succession planning can be viewed as “replacement planning" for the key management roles in your business.

While no one wants an illness or accident to interrupt our lives or the running of our business, it can happen without warning or time to prepare. To make sure your business can continue without problems, it is important that you prepare in advance and have the right people in the right positions. Research indicates that clear, understandable objectives are crucial to establishing effective business succession planning. The following objectives tend to be core to many or most companies that have well-established succession plans:

• Communicate the career development expectations of existing employees and make sure that expectations are aligned

• Improve overall employee retention and commitment to the business

• Mitigate the costs and difficulty associated with recruiting employees externally

• Identify employees with exceptional potential

• Provide ongoing development experiences to those that can move up in the organization

• Train key employees in leadership practices

• Build a key employee data base that can be used to make better staffing decisions for key jobs