The future is in their hands, let them shape it

For many accountants, a successful succession plan involves the development of their senior team and much of my mentoring and coaching role revolves around this.

It’s great to see firm leaders supporting and encouraging their team, looking to build the next generation of leaders for their firm, but I worry at times about such development consciously or sub-consciously limiting the firm’s future by shaping it too much around the thinking of the existing leadership. Do we create mini me’s?

I hear phrases such as “I see something of me in them”, “I have a gut feel about this one”, “I’m passing on my own experiences”. We all must recognise as business leaders that our skills and thinking brought the firm to where it is today, often in our mould. Succession is about tomorrow, about the next generation of leadership.

From recruitment, through training and development, mentoring, and coaching, we have to be aware of striking the right balance. We want continuity of culture and values and it’s a strength to be able to use our experience to mentor others, but we have to allow them to shape the future and not try and shape it for them. Promoting someone because we relate to them or telling someone how we would do the job is not necessarily the best preparation for your firm’s continued success.

Think about how you can maintain your firm’s culture and development without forcing its future down your pre-determined path:

• Recruitment: Don’t go on gut feel but take a more structured and systemised approach, involving external expertise. Recruits have to be a great fit for your firm’s culture and values but, beyond that, it’s skills and individual characteristics that matter, not simply whether they make you feel comfortable

• Training: Don’t limit external training to technical knowledge. Management and personal skills training should be delivered externally as well to introduce new ideas

• Development: Encourage your team to experience different work and group environments through secondment, volunteering, involvement in organisations, etc. Let them see how others do it.

• Learning: Encourage your team to expand their minds. Whether watching TED talks, joining peer groups, or seeking further and wider business qualifications, let your team develop their ideas.

• Coaching: By all means, coach your team and share your experience and expertise, but ensure that it is in an open manner, fully encouraging their input. Also, use external coaches, help your team to have a wider perspective.

• Mentoring: Again, you being a mentor can have huge benefits to your firm, but remember that mentoring is about bringing the best out of others, not reshaping them into someone else.

If you get your leadership right then your team will reflect your values, ethics, and principles. They will share your vision. Creating that should be your prime goal when it comes to your succession. As long as your team shares your vision then the pathways they choose to get there in the future should be down to them.

Focus on vision, give your team space, support, and opportunity to shape the future.