CEO Succession Planning: What boards get wrong
June 11, 2020
Audrey Smith, Ph.D. Matt Paese, Ph.D.
CEO succession planning should be top of mind for CHROs and boards. If it’s not, expect to be blindsided.

CEO succession planning should be top of mind for CHROs and boards of directors right now. If it’s not, you might be blindsided by a sudden change that could expose serious vulnerability for the company.
The data points to a period of rapid CEO turnover in the near future. Even at relatively stable companies, the new economy is going to demand much more of CEOs.
Many CEOs will decide they want to jump ship, looking for a better payout elsewhere. And many boards will have to make tough choices about whether their CEO is really the right person to lead in the new paradigm going forward.
That’s why CEO succession planning is so important NOW. And it can’t just be an informal plan created by the board to choose whichever candidate seems most obvious. Because in reality, boards get it wrong – a lot.
In this whitepaper, C-Suite experts Audrey Smith, Ph.D., and Matt Paese, Ph.D., offer advice to help you begin your CEO succession planning strategy. They’ll cover:
- The research pointing to rapid CEO churn ahead
- The key mistakes that boards make in their CEO succession planning processes
- The five critical actions every board needs to take now to avoid risk and prime their C-suite for success

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