Sucession planning - the three questions that really matter

There is a question that turns up with depressing regularity in succession planning meetings.

“What if X goes under a bus?”

Everyone knows what comes next. A brief pause, a glance at the organisation chart, and a reassuring answer. The CFO could step in if it is the CEO. The deputy could cover while we run a search. Someone sensible. Someone steady.

Job done. Move on.

Except it is not done at all. In fact, that question, and the way it is usually answered, reveals how superficial most emergency succession planning really is.

Emergency succession is not about naming a spare body. It is about understanding what the business would actually need in that moment. And that depends entirely on context.

When you end up in hospital, the doctors do not start by deciding who will operate. They start with diagnosis. Are you stable? Is this life threatening? Is it trauma, infection, or something systemic? Until they know that, every intervention is a guess.

Yet in business, we often skip the diagnosis entirely.

Three questions that really matter

If a senior leader disappears overnight, there are three questions that must be answered before you even think about names.

1. How stable is the company right now?

If the business is performing well, the strategy is clear, the market is calm, and the organisation has momentum, then yes, you may simply need a safe pair of hands.

In that scenario, the priority is continuity. Execution, discipline, and reassurance. The skills required are operational grip, credibility with the board, and the ability to keep the machine running without introducing unnecessary change.

But many organisations assume this is the default case. It rarely is.

2. Was this a real bus, or a metaphorical one?

Sometimes the leader has not been hit by a bus at all. They have been removed.

A scandal breaks. A regulatory issue explodes. Something internal leaks to the press. The leader has to go immediately.

Now you are dealing with a very different problem. Reputation risk. Media scrutiny. Internal fear and speculation. External stakeholders who are nervous and impatient.

The person who steps in needs a very specific skill set. They must be able to manage the narrative, stabilise the organisation emotionally, and make decisions at speed with imperfect information. They need judgement under pressure, not just technical competence.

Putting a steady operator into a crisis like this can make things worse, not better.

3. Was the departed leader seen as the saviour?

There is a third scenario that boards often underestimate.

The business is already in trouble. Performance is weak. The market is sceptical. And the leader who has just gone was seen, rightly or wrongly, as the one person who might turn things around.

When that leader disappears, confidence can collapse overnight.

In this case, the successor does not just need operational skill or crisis management capability. They need credibility with investors, customers, and employees. They need to be seen as someone who can lead change, not merely hold the fort.

This is a very different profile again.

Same vacancy, completely different leaders

These scenarios all involve the same role on paper. CEO. CFO. Managing Director.

But the skills required in each case are fundamentally different.

This is where most succession planning falls down. We talk about people, not capabilities. We ask who could step up, without asking what stepping up would actually involve.

Personality tools, colour codes, and leadership styles can be interesting, but in moments like this they are a distraction. What matters is skill.

Who can handle a hostile media cycle?
Who can calm a frightened organisation?
Who can lead radical change at speed?
Who can execute relentlessly without drama?

If you cannot answer those questions with confidence, you do not have a succession plan. You have a list.

Knowledge is the real bottleneck

In an emergency, you will have very little time. There will be no long assessments, no development plans, no careful grooming of successors.

You will act with the knowledge you already have.  That is why real succession planning is about building and maintaining a deep, honest understanding of the leadership skills you have at your disposal, and the gaps you are carrying.

Not just at the top, but one and two layers down.

It requires leaders to be skill coded, not just role titled. It requires boards and executive teams to face uncomfortable truths about readiness and risk. And it requires ongoing work, not an annual workshop.

The bus question is not wrong. It is just dangerously incomplete.

The real question is this.

If the worst happened tomorrow, do we genuinely know which leader has the skills to take us through what comes next?