Options in Leadership Transition

Abstract

It seems funny to call something an innovation when it’s been around for decades, at least in the for-profit world. But in the nonprofit world, the use of an interim executive director seems truly to be an innovation. People’s eyebrows rise when you mention the concept, as if to ask, “We can do that in the nonprofit sector?”

An interim executive director may not be the silver bullet or panacea board or staff members seek, but it is certainly often the best solution for so many nonprofits facing an executive transition, be it forced or planned.  Boards that refuse to even consider such an approach are failing in their responsibility to always do what is in the best interest of the organization.

According to The Nonprofit Center’s most recent executive transitions survey of November 2009, 67 percent of those executive directors who have given any thought to leaving their position plan to leave by 2012. Sixty percent of these exiting executive directors will give six or fewer months’ notice to their boards; 30 percent will give less than five months’ notice.  And at the organizations of these exiting executive directors, 61 percent have had, at best, informal discussions at the board or staff level about succession planning, while at worst, 30 percent have had no succession planning discussions at any level.  Only 7 percent of these organizations have done any formal succession planning.