You may be completely revved up to start a legitimate student group at your school. You may have what it takes to create a vibrant community of young freethinkers on your campus. You may even become an active participant in the national movement. But eventually you are going to graduate. That is why you must plan ahead to ensure the group continues without you. This is especially important at a smaller college where groups have an even greater tendency to dissolve without strong initiative.
Planning for a successful succession
The vital transmission of knowledge from one generation of freethinkers to the next (Camp Quest, ca. 2003)
1. Identify Key Roles Key roles are ones that are critical to the success of your group, like President and Treasurer. When you begin succession planning, evaluate these roles to see if they are accurate, necessary, and sufficient. If the current leaders are highly dedicated, but future leaders may not be willing to put in so much time, it might be a good idea to divide roles between more people. These new roles could be chairs for specific activities or functions, like volunteering, website management, or social chair. If a group is smaller, it might be a good idea to delete a position that is unnecessary or unlikely to be filled.
2. Survey Current Situation Are people with the required skills and talents already excited about running for leadership positions for next year? Are there people in the group who might do a better job but simply have not identified themselves as good for the role? How about two years down the road? If you’ve got it covered for two years down the road, you’re likely okay. Otherwise, ask yourself who within the group could do the best job at these key roles. Do you need to find ways to draw in new people outside of the group that might become leaders?
3. Directly Approach Potential Leaders If you have the feeling that someone would be good in a leadership role, take them aside after a meeting and tell them. Be as specific as possible both about what the responsibilities of the job are and why you think he or she would be good at the role.
4. Nurture Once you have someone who is at least tentatively interested in a key role, have that person begin to work with the person that presently holds that role. Perhaps she or he can act as an assistant, or just watch the current role holder work. Your school may offer training for that role—do whatever you can to get the potential leader into that training.
5. Support When the new person has taken on the role, don’t abandon them. If it is at all possible for you to stay around and support them, do so. Ideally, get the person into the role a year before you graduate so you can simply be available as a resource when he or she needs you. Your final year may be quite busy… job hunting, finishing up a thesis, etc. may make you a less than ideal choice for filling a key role anyway. If you cannot physically be around during his/her first year in the position, at least give the new leader your phone number and email address. Make a commitment to answering his/her requests for help promptly.
6. Repeat Make sure you impart the importance of succession planning to the new crop of leaders. It’s very common for a group to die after its second crop of leaders graduate. Make sure they get a copy of this guide.
General Succession Advice
If you follow the process above, you should be set. Here are some additional tips that will help make the process easier.
Cliché but true...
Cross Train If only one person in your group knows how to do something, you’re in trouble. If she or he gets sick or leaves the group, you will be in a difficult situation. Do your best to have officers train at least one other person in the group in their roles.
Preserve the Core The character of most organizations is determined largely by its leaders. As people change, the organization is going to change—this is a good thing. However, odds are there are some core aspects of the group you do not want to change. The most obvious aspect is your group’s commitment to naturalism. There may be other elements as well that you believe are core to its identity. Make sure you write down these core values, talk about them with the new leaders and practice them in your own leadership. You need to use both the written word and organizational traditions to preserve what is most important about your group. Try to pick just three to six things and focus on those. The fewer core values you pick, the more likely those values will be to survive.
Document Best Practices The more you write down about the job you do, the better. If you get sick or leave the group, at least the new leaders have your notes. The SSA can help you set up some very easy to use web-based tools that will help you store your documentation on the Internet where people from your group can have access to it. Contact us today: ssa@secularstudents.org or 1.877.842.9474.
Diversify and Open Up Don’t hoard power and responsibility. Any new member has great leadership potential, but if you don't give them opportunities to lead, that potential may never be realized. Utilize each individual's talents and interests, and do not pigeonhole or assume someone would do a bad job when they haven't been given the chance. Diversify those who lead the group, if possible. Try to get a leadership of various viewpoints on the freethinking spectrum, different genders, and especially different ages/graduation years. The leaders often set the tone for a group and having all of one type can leave some people feeling alienated. Having different graduation years helps the group maintain some consistency, experience, and a better chance at long-term success.
