Four thoughts on succession planning I can’t stop thinking about after my interview with Tracie Sanlin
Back in our Collegiate days, at our long-awaited ribbon cutting ceremony for our high school!
Going live last week with Tracie Sanlin, my friend and successor at Chicago Collegiate where she serves as the CEO, was a blast. You can catch the replay here or on my LinkedIn page—or embedded below or as an audio version on my podcast! Like all great conversations, this one has stuck with me over the last few days, and I wanted to share a few things I’ve been thinking about since we spoke.
A leadership position has to be a mutually good fit. We talk about when Tracie came to Collegiate, she had to do a lot of soul-searching about whether it was time to leave her traditional public school. Tracie said “I always jokingly say every leader needs a therapist. I do truly believe that—especially transitioning, which requires you to do a lot of self examination to determine why you are leaving, or entering, and what you need and what you need to be asking for, and what you're gonna leave behind and being okay.” We talked about how it’s important to think as an individual “What do I need to thrive?”. On the hiring side, it’s “What does our organization really need right now?” Getting clear on that is KEY—so often people want to rush to post the role and get candidates, but really the few minutes or hours spent thinking or talking or analyzing what the organization needs will truly set you up to be successful with the right hire. It’s got to be the right fit on both sides.
Being really thoughtful about what the organization needs in its next iteration is critically important in succession planning. I joked about it in the Live, but like Tracie’s joke it’s true: I am the solo parent of three young children and I spent more time thinking about who would take over my school than who would take my children in the event of my demise. (I fortunately have amazing parents, don’t plan on going anywhere anytime soon, and transitioning the school’s custody was imminent!) I knew that while I brought a lot of wonderful things to starting a school, the next stage required a leader who was incredibly strategic about the minefield of landmines that exist for charter schools in Chicago and who would be unrelenting in pursuing consistent excellence. Hearing about what Tracie is achieving in her first year of leadership (like almost 200 college acceptances for 25 students by February 3!) In our time before going on air, we chatted briefly about some of the day’s challenges running a small charter network in the middle of the Great Resignation—and how Collegiate has largely escaped those shockwaves, in large part due to many of Tracie’s leadership moves.
It is a joy to see someone work in their Strengths. We did a lot of Strengths work at Collegiate before I was a certified Gallup Strengths Coach, and then as part of my certification process I coached Tracie. We talked a little bit about how her Strengths come to light in her work: as an Arranger, she loves playing with the school schedule. Play is exactly the verb she’d use—which baffles me as someone who has spent a lot of time with school schedules and their complexity. Tracie combines that with her Strategic Strength (which really allows her to see all the possible computations of any path ahead at a 20,000 level view… I’ve always been so jealous of that Strength) to think about how today’s schedule will impact the next several years at Collegiate.
A commitment to Diversity, Equity and Inclusion is fundamentally about showing up and doing the work. Tracie and I discussed some of what we were proudest of in our DEI work, and agreed that the organization took several leaps forward when we started building this work in consistently: some years it was monthly All-Hands time, other times it was quarterly step-backs… but when the work had a consistent place in our schedules, we moved the needle. Using a shared text was also helpful, and as Tracie talked about, we not only set the norms like “Be comfortable with being uncomfortable”, but acted on it. As she said “People always say that, but we really mean it. Like we put out boxes of tissues. And when people start crying, the conversations don't stop. People walk out, we go check on them. How are you feeling? High five on the back? You good? We expect for you to come back inside and continue engaging.”
As Tracie is known to say, it was a JUICY conversation. There’s much more to think about—watch the replay if you want to hear Tracie’s leadership recommendations for books to read, leaders she admires, shared texts she’s used with her staff and the best time of year to transition the CEO role. And if you find yourself thinking “I really need help thinking about succession planning at my organization”, schedule a complementary call with me here to see if partnering together might be a mutually good fit. I’m excited to help more leaders have wins in succession planning and internal leadership development like Tracie and I experienced !
What did you take away from the conversation with Tracie? Leave a comment below!
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Catch the replay of our Live here!