The GOAT is gone - What now?

The sports headlines shouted out last night that Nick Saban, arguably the GOAT of college football coaching, was announcing his retirement. An unexpected and shocking change in direction from November when he said he wasn’t ready yet. Who knows what transpired, but what we do know is there has been immediate fallout.

The number three receiver in next year’s recruiting class decommitted immediately. Alabama has no succession plan. There are no internal candidates ready to take over. I am sure that the AD has a list of candidates that he will pursue, but at what cost. He will only pursue the best of the best, Lanning, Swinney, Sarkasian, etc. The cost of hiring them away just in terms of buyouts will be staggering (not Jimbo Fisher staggering, but still staggering). All the coaches that have already been mentioned have great jobs, at great schools, with great contracts. Plus, following the GOAT at the school where he became the GOAT is a no-win situation.

We all know that college football is a business – just like your business. A lack of succession planning and a lack of a clear, strong transitional plan can (and most likely will be) devastating to your firm.

In the past year and a half, I have heard of/know of regional, national, and multinational companies making the decisions to move on from top leadership including legacy CEOs in some cases. Whatever the reasons they made these decisions, the stories I have heard are all ones where the decision-makers made these changes it without a succession or transition plan believing that the employees of the companies/subsidiaries would be loyal to the company even though there had been significant turmoil since the subsidiary was acquired. The shame of these situations is that the companies had these initiatives in the works for quite a while and had time to develop strong plans. They didn’t put enough thought into who had the respect of the staff, how would the dismissal of the CEO or other leaders be perceived, the additional uncertainty that would be caused in the organization, and the list goes on. All of this in an industry where every company is struggling to hire. As a result in all of these companies, employees left, clients left, and revenue decreased.

What should Alabama have done?

What should these companies have done?

Realizing you are always one decision, one event, or one catastrophe away from losing a leader, a key person, a rising star. Unfortunately, frequently these situations “blindside” us and we scramble to make decisions and try to fix or manage the situation and we don’t accurately understand the impact on our staff, our clients, or the other leaders who are having to pick up the slack.

What should you be doing?

1)??????? Develop a succession plan not just for the CEO or other leaders, but throughout your organization down to the level of anyone who can impact employee morale, client service and the flow of revenue (which is impacted by employee morale and client service).

2)??????? Every person in your organization should be training their replacement. This needs to be a part of their job description. This requires a consistent plan, training people how to train, and understanding where people want to go in their careers.

3)??????? If you are planning the exit of a C-Suite person or another leader (it should always be planned whether it is a retirement, a termination, or leaving for another opportunity), develop a transition plan that includes a detailed communication plan that rolls from the leadership down to the least experienced employee. At the end of the day, your team needs to believe that there is a real plan, that you aren’t making it up as you go, and that they can trust you. Your team is your greatest asset. They have to be bought into what you are doing.

This isn’t a comprehensive how-to. This is just to get you thinking about where you are at in your planning for success by having a solid companywide succession plan. Most companies are so focused on the day to day and executing the financial plan that they forget to plan for the inevitable time when key staff leaves. Would love to talk about your plan or to help you build one. Let me know if I can help.