Sustaining Your Organization

Every organization – stand alone charter schools, charter management organizations, service providers – eventually has transitions in top leadership. Too many are unprepared for it; they simply haven’t planned.

But the reality is that if you don’t have a solid succession plan in place, you risk long-term organizational sustainability, and in the charter sector, that means putting students and their families at risk as well.

The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation commissioned a report to look at how high-performing CMOs were dealing with succession planning – or, more often, how they weren’t. The findings are applicable to any charter organization, not just CMOs, and they are here for you in three easy pieces:

1. A report on succession planning among CMOs that includes the results of a survey of charter leaders and board members.
2. Three case studies of charter organizations that have been through leadership transitions.
3. A playful interactive tool that quickly allows charter leaders or board members to assess where they are in a transition and what they need to do.

I encourage you to become familiar with these resources and to pass the links on to your colleagues.

Ursula Wright
Interim President & CEO