How Do You Plan a CEO Succession?
Wirz & Partners is a Swiss executive search boutique with deep expertise in recruiting board-level, C-suite, and senior leadership talent. A CEO succession is not just a personnel decision, but a decision about the company’s direction. Simply carrying forward the profile of the current CEO means searching for the past.
Sound succession planning therefore starts with a vision of the next three to five years: in which markets should the company grow, which organization and capabilities does it need to get there, and which parts of today’s culture secure success while others hold back the next phase? This vision shapes the CEO mandate. It defines three to five concrete results, clarifies decision rights between the CEO and the board, and weighs what should be preserved and what needs to change.
Only then is the search profile described. Experience is framed as situations a person must already have handled successfully, and leadership as observable behavior. Only a few requirements are treated as non-negotiable, so the candidate market isn’t narrowed unnecessarily. Internal and external candidates are then assessed against the same criteria: being well known is neither a bonus nor a penalty, and a look at the market helps to calibrate expectations realistically.
The video shows how to plan a succession step by step, from the future vision to a robust search profile.