The Importance of Bench Strength

Bench strength. It's a concept equally applicable in business and in sports. In the HR world, people would call managing bench strength succession planning. Regardless of the context, when your star player goes down, who is going to step in to lead your team?

This concept of “bench strength” is pretty much the only thing keeping the 2010 Boston Red Sox afloat. In what is considered to be the most competitive division in Major League Baseball, the Red Sox have lost their Cy Young Award-winning ace pitcher, starting center fielder, starting catcher, starting second baseman - a former league MVP,  and their starting left fielder who stole 70 bases in 2009.

Bringing this back to the office for a moment. Imagine walking in on Monday to find out that the CEO has gone on sabbatical, and the CFO has decided that finance and investors are just not for him, and will be sailing around the world for the next 24 months. Tuesday rolls around and your vice president of sales has taken a job with your nearest competitor, and the SVP of business development has decided to retire at the end of the next month.

True, the scenario is unlikely, but hardly implausible. How do you plan on filling any of the senior leadership positions in your organization? Do you plan on recruiting from outside your organization? Wouldn’t you rather promote someone internally who is intimately familiar with your strategy and who has been groomed by one of your team's proven leaders.

How often do you think about your bench? Oftentimes, we do not think about bench strength until it is too late. If you can answer these questions, you are certainly ahead of the game: Who is your next VP of sales?  Your next CFO?  How about your next HR director?