Heir line pilots: How to navigate a successful route to your next leader

摘要

Too often, working out who is going to take over the running of a firm when the current boss retires is not given the appropriate priority, which can lead to a business in transition falling into further confusion. To outsiders it seemed a natural succession: the young Scottish leader had been successfully running a rival, although much smaller, operation in the neighbouring county to that of the grizzled Glaswegian elder statesman. So when the latter decided to step down after years at the helm, his annointed heir seemed an obvious choice. However, after less than a year in the job, having failed to take the business forward, the younger man was ousted and ultimately replaced by a vastly more experienced peer. Although you might struggle to draw many parallels between the print industry and Premier League football, Manchester United's decision to replace Sir Alex Ferguson with David Moyes, is a scenario that's commonly replicated across numerous different industries, including print, on a regular basis.