🔁 Succession planning in start-ups: Focus on impact, not process

TL;DR

🔁 Succession planning in start-ups: Focus on impact, not process

🔍 Succession planning made simple: Get visibility on critical roles

❓ Your views on succession planning

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Succession planning in start-ups: Focus on impact, not process

When I get asked, “How do I do succession planning for the whole organisation?” my first response isn’t a detailed how-to guide. Instead, I ask the critical question: “WHY do you even want to do this?”

In the world of start-ups, time is a luxury you don’t have. There are endless fires to fight and opportunities to chase. So before jumping into any major HR initiative, especially one as resource-heavy as succession planning, you need to be crystal clear on the problem you're solving and the impact it will have.

Start with the WHY

Succession planning isn't just an HR checkbox. It’s about safeguarding your business against risk. But unless you know exactly where the biggest risks are, you’ll waste precious time planning for roles that are not at risk to business continuity.

Here’s a conversation I had with a VP of People (VoP) that highlights this:

This is the difference between busy work and impactful work.

Focus on the biggest risks for maximum impact

Succession planning for every role might sound thorough, but in a start-up, that’s a three-month project you don’t have time for. And here’s the reality — even after all that effort, the biggest risk to business continuity might still be tied to just a few roles.

Pareto Principle it! Focus your effort on the 20% of roles that, if left uncovered, could create 80% of the risk to your business. That’s the kind of efficiency start-ups live and die rely on to survive and scale.

Speed and focus win every time

In start-ups, speed is a competitive advantage. If you focus on the roles with the highest impact, you can complete a high-stakes succession plan in two weeks — not three months. That’s how you mitigate risk quickly and free up your team to tackle the next big challenge.

A bloated, organisation-wide succession plan may look impressive on paper, but it’s not what your start-up needs right now. You need fast, focused, and impact-driven solutions.

Delivering 10x business impact

Stop doing HR for HR’s sake (or if you prefer, People/PX/P&C for People/PX/P&C’s sake). Your role as a strategic HR leader isn’t to tick boxes — it’s to drive the business forward. That means:

Succession planning should be a scalpel, not a sledgehammer. Get in, identify the critical risks, create targeted plans, and move on.

The goal? Solve the biggest problems with the biggest impact — quickly.

Because in a start-up, that’s how you win.

Succession planning made simple: Get visibility on critical roles

In the section above, I emphasised why succession planning should never be treated as a HR checkbox exercise. In start-ups, you need to focus on impact and urgency, not bloated HR processes. The scope of your succession planning—whether highly targeted or more expansive—should always reflect what the business truly needs.

Now, let’s get tactical. I’ll walk you through how my team approached the succession planning initiative, which was led by Maxine Peetz — not as the only way to do it, but as a framework you can adapt to fit your business context. (👇Below, you’ll find a sample of our worksheet and a video briefing for managers to spark ideas and guide your approach.)

Our purpose was simple:

To keep things lean and actionable, we focused on 2 core phases:

This newsletter focuses on the Phase 1, getting visibility into the roles that could make or break your business.

Phase 1: Getting visibility for the next 12 months

Step 1: Identify ‘Critical Roles’ based on business impact

We started by assessing the roles, NOT people. We want to identify the positions that, if left unfilled, would create major business disruptions. It’s about protecting continuity, not evaluating individual performance.

We used 4 key criteria (aligned with our business priorities) to rank roles as high, medium, or low priority:

We kept it tight—only 10% of roles should be classified as high-priority. Prioritisation forces you to focus on the real risks instead of spreading efforts too thin.

Step 2: Assess ‘Flight Risk’

Now that you know which roles are critical, shift focus to the people in those roles. Are they likely to leave? 

Here’s what we look for:

Step 3: Identify potential ‘Successors’

Next, identify who could step in if a critical role suddenly became vacant. 

This step is all about proactive planning—knowing who’s next in line before you’re forced to scramble.

Step 4: Assess ‘Readiness’

Not all successors are ready right now and that’s okay. The goal here is to assess how long it would take for them to fully step into the role.

When assessing readiness, consider:

The golden rule: Never do this in a silo

As this phase of Talent Mapping is all about getting visibility, one manager’s view isn’t enough. While line managers kick off the process by completing a worksheet based on the criteria above, calibration is critical.

Why is this important? It eliminates bias, surfaces hidden talent, and ensures you’re making decisions based on a complete, accurate picture.

Move fast, stay focused

Talent Mapping (a.k.a. succession planning) isn’t about complexity—it’s about getting visibility and taking action. When done right, it prevents last-minute scrambles and ensures your business keeps moving, no matter what.

Start-up survival isn’t about having a perfect process. It’s about solving the biggest risks with the biggest impact—fast.

⚠️P.S. It’s important to remember—succession planning is not the same as performance management.

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