Week 27: The Bench Is the Strategy | The Other 5%

Why Great Organizations Develop Their Next Leaders Before They Need Them

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Someone resigns.

A Regional VP leaves.

An Executive Director gets promoted.

A senior leader announces their retirement.

And suddenly, the search begins.

Who do we know?
Who is ready?
Who can step in?
Who can we recruit?

We move quickly because we have to. The position is open, the communities need leadership, and the organization cannot afford to wait.

But maybe the most important question isn't who we hire when the position opens.

It's why we waited until the position opened to start looking.

Senior living has historically been pretty good at giving people opportunities.

Sometimes too good.

We find a talented Executive Director and give them three communities.

We find a strong Regional and promote them to VP.

We see potential in someone and give them a bigger job.

Then we hope they figure it out.

Sink or swim.

And sometimes they swim.

But hope isn't a talent strategy.

The best organizations should know their bench long before they need it.

That starts at the community level.

Who are the department heads showing leadership beyond their job description?

Which Executive Directors consistently develop strong teams?

Who has performed well in a stable community?

More importantly, who has walked into a difficult community and made it better?

Who can grow occupancy?
Who can stabilize labor?
Who improves culture?
Who develops other leaders?
Who performs consistently instead of occasionally?

We have more data available to answer those questions than ever before.

Occupancy.
Turnover.
Agency usage.
Resident satisfaction.
Financial performance.
Survey outcomes.
Collections.
Team retention.
Sales performance.

But the opportunity isn't simply to rank people on a dashboard.

It's to use the data to start a conversation.

Maybe an Executive Director's numbers suggest they have an unusual ability to stabilize struggling teams.

Maybe another consistently develops department heads who eventually become Executive Directors themselves.

Maybe someone else runs a great building but has never been exposed to a turnaround.

Those patterns can tell us something.

And once we identify potential, the next step shouldn't immediately be promotion.

It should be preparation.

Give the future Regional exposure to multiple communities before they are responsible for them.

Let them participate in a turnaround.

Include them in budget conversations.

Give them exposure to ownership meetings.

Pair them with an experienced leader.

Teach them how to coach another Executive Director instead of simply running their own building well.

Let them struggle with some of the responsibilities of the next job while they still have the support of their current one.

Plant the seed early.

Because being great at one job doesn't automatically prepare someone for the next one.

Development has to happen between those two moments.

The same thinking should exist at the highest levels of the organization.

Who is the next COO?
Who could eventually lead operations?
Who understands the culture deeply enough to protect it through a transition?
Who has relationships across the organization?

What experiences would that person need over the next two or three years to actually be ready?

Succession planning can sometimes feel like something reserved for retirement conversations and board meetings.

It shouldn't.

It is simply another version of developing the bench.

And there is a very practical reason this matters so much in senior living.

Leadership transitions don't happen on a spreadsheet.

They happen inside communities.

When a Regional position sits open, Executive Directors feel it.

When an Executive Director position turns over repeatedly, department heads feel it.

When leadership becomes unstable, caregivers feel it.

And eventually, residents and families feel it too.

That is the part we cannot lose sight of.

A resident shouldn't experience organizational instability because we failed to prepare someone for their next opportunity.

Great organizations don't start succession planning when somebody gives notice.

They are constantly asking:

Who is ready now?
Who could be ready in a year?
Who has potential but needs a different experience?
And what are we doing today to prepare them?

Because growing talent from within isn't simply about employee retention.

It isn't just about creating career paths.

And it isn't about avoiding recruiter fees.

It's about continuity.

The strongest organizations don't just know who their leaders are today.

They know who their leaders could be tomorrow.

And they start preparing them long before tomorrow arrives.

Because when the next leadership position opens, the best answer shouldn't always be, "Who can we find?"

Sometimes it should be:

"We've been preparing someone for this."

And that often lives in The Other 5%.

—JT

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