Succession planning tools enable you to identify candidates whom you might want to place into critical roles when members of your leadership retire or leave your organization. While there are many succession planning tools and templates that are available for download at a cost, you can also find an assortment of free succession planning tools online. Why would you go through the effort of using a succession planning tool, you ask? Great question! There are several benefits to being proactive when it comes to strategizing for the health of your organization.

Succession planning:

• Helps disaster-proof your business so you’re prepared with go-to people to put into place, should sudden changes arise
• Identifies your most-qualified future leaders
• Creates a structure for training and development
• Ensures you have extra eyes on particular roles and responsibilities
• Maintains brand identity
• Keeps your company planning for long-term goals

Plus, once you make succession planning a regular part of your organization’s routine, it’ll be second nature to keep an eye on upcoming talent and track their progress as they grow through your company.

As you embark on your journey to plan for your organization, you might consider starting with a succession planning toolkit. A succession planning toolkit PDF is a great way to force your leaders to think about your brand in ways they might not consider on a day-to-day basis. Toolkits usually include the following materials:

• Succession planning questionnaire – This tool will help you identify significant business challenges in the next one to five years
• Succession planning report example – This will give you an idea of what your results will look like after you’ve examined the current and future states of your business
• Succession planning worksheet – This is what you’ll use to get into the analysis of your organization, identifying what’s going on currently, what kind of changes are expected to take place in the near future, what critical roles you have in your business, and the critical success factors that would make someone who needs to step into leadership positions be successful.

A succession planning template can be beneficial for getting started with succession planning while supporting a salable and replicable approach. When you utilize a succession planning template for managers, you’ll be able to see different perspectives of your business, which can help you identify any gaps in your brand’s mission and values. Succession plan templates come in a variety of formats and can be used to support success at various levels of an organization. The following are some types of succession planning templates you might consider using:

• Succession planning template Excel. Free versions of this type of template can be found online. This is often a great option because many leaders and HR professionals are accustom to using Excel in their daily routines.
• Succession plan template Word format. There are great Word versions of succession planning documents, too. These are great options if you want to brainstorm thoughts and record observations about your company. Of course, you can always combine Excel and Word templates to gain the most perspective possible.
• Succession planning template for government agencies. Government agencies operate much differently than corporate or small business environments. If you’re in the governmental sector, seek out a succession planning template that’s designed with your organization’s unique needs in mind.
• Talent and succession planning templates. What makes good employees great at what they do? How can you replicate their passions, skills, and abilities in future candidates? A talent and succession planning template will help you better understand where successes and opportunities lie within your current staff and future candidates.
• Leadership succession plan template. The last thing you want to happen is to have a vacant CEO position with no viable prospects to step in and take charge. This is why leadership succession plans are imperative for your C-suite executives.
• Emergency succession plan template. Unfortunately, you can’t always plan for everything, and sometimes, life makes you scramble to find solutions. An emergency succession plan template will help guide you through the process so you enjoy as optimal an outcome as possible.

If you’re looking for a succession planning template, SHRM has a customizable presentation that can help you better understand why these steps are important and present your thoughts to applicable team members. This will help everyone get on the same page with succession planning template and process activities. Once everyone’s viewed the presentation, you can distribute a succession planning template PDF that relevant leaders can fill out and submit back to you.

If you’re looking for a succession plan example, consider this one from the University of Washington. Note how this succession plan example PDF guides you through ways to assess, evaluate, and develop your organization. It’s a simple succession plan example, but it does the job, making you think about your company from a critical point of view. In this company succession plan example, you’ll see how it begins with step one forcing you to think about the current and future states of affairs for your organization. Following that, step two asks you to identify critical positions that will be needed to support business continuity. The following steps then focus on what you can do to achieve optimal success and minimal disruptions within your work environment. This company succession plan example is a great starting point if you haven’t examined the health of your company for a while.

A succession planning model represents an integral part of succession planning. As part of your succession planning framework, you might consider working from a number of different models, such as the 9-box succession planning model. This succession planning model example shows an individual employee’s current and potential level of contribution to the organization. A succession planning model of a company helps leaders understand where their most valuable assets are so they can work to bolster their career paths moving forward. As you begin assessing your organization, consider using succession planning model PDF templates. There are many different succession model templates that you can find online, so you don’t have to try to start from scratch when you’re just getting started in the process. You might also consider using succession planning model PPT presentations or succession planning model slideshare presentations to share the concept with the leadership team in your organization.

Now that you know was the various different applications of succession planning are, we can dive into the succession planning process. SHRM’s succession planning PDF explains the process well. In short, your succession planning strategy enables you to develop leadership talent that’s brought up within your organization’s culture values and norms, ensuring consistency of the brand and continuity of work when leadership members need to be replaced. Take a look at this succession planning PPT to get a slide-by-slide view of the process and see a sample succession planning strategy put into place. Indeed also offers a succession planning process template that explains various types and walks you through how to get the most out of the various models.

The aforementioned strategies can be streamlined and better supported with succession planning software. The best succession planning software options will offer heaps of features that enable you to capture employees’ skills and proactively identify potential candidates for roles, either as internal or external applicants. There are dozens of succession planning systems available; Some succession planning solutions are a bit costly, but there are affordable and even free versions, too.  Succession planning software free versions won’t have as many bells and whistles as paid versions, of course, but they can still help you see your organization in a critical way. If you’re looking for a succession planning management software, it might be easier to start with a free version so you can see what kind of functionality would work best for your organization, should you choose to upgrade to a paid option.