Effective Succession Planning: Ensuring Leadership Continuity and Building Talent From Within
by William J. Rothwell

Probably one of the most thorough books on the topic (and a fine complement to The Leadership Pipeline), incorporating methodical and meticulous guidelines to preparing for and quickly filling crucial vacancies at all levels of the organization, from top management to sales, administrative, technical, and production positions. Not only does it lay out a plan for instituting a long-term succession planning program that includes everything from early action steps to ongoing evaluation and revision, it also shows how to develop, monitor, and evaluate talent and skills in individual employees in order to promote effectively from within (although it acknowledges that sometimes the best choices come from outside, and offers key steps for optimizing the outside-search process as well).

Everything is covered here, from the legal implications of hiring and firing and online and high-tech resources to major trends that will affect succession planning in the years ahead. And, thank god, the author has incorporated some case studies--both fictional/composite and those of several large real-life companies.

Systematic Succession Planning: Building Leadership from Within (Crisp Fifty-Minute Series) by Rebecca Luhn Wolfe

Succession planning saves the cost and time of external personnel searches. It improves employee morale, lessens the effects of reengineering and downsizing, but most important, it creates a diverse talent pool within your organization. This book was written to guide you through the evaluation process of succession planning. It describes the guidelines for setting up a program, along with benchmarking procedures for ensuring the ongoing success of your plan.

Learning Objectives: To explain the benefits of a systematic succession plan. To help you develop a succession program to meet your organization's needs. To show how to identify leaders and leadership positions. To explain the operation and evaluation of a systematic succession plan

Career Planning and Succession Management : Developing Your Organization's Talent--for Today and Tomorrow by William J. Rothwell

Many organizations are scrambling to prepare for an expected wave of retirements. Almost twice as many job openings are occurring from people retiring than from economic expansion--a direct function of a steadily aging workforce. The implications for businesses, government agencies, nonprofits, and educational institutions are enormous, as organizational leaders maneuver to fill the talent pipeline. In this context, organizations are stepping up their investments in career planning (training and development programs to help employees hone their skills and qualify for advancement) and succession management (programs designed to ensure the continuity of leadership). To date, however, these programs have generally been treated in isolation. Drawing from a survey of 1,000 human resource practitioners and a wide variety of case examples, the authors demonstrate how to create that crucial link between succession and career development programs--developing one's organization's talent from the bottom up and the top down simultaneously. Featuring numerous diagnostics, checklists, and other interactive elements, Career Planning and Succession Management will become an indispensable guide for leaders and human resource professionals looking to align individual and organizational goals and ensure their economic future.

Succession Planning: Take Two by Sandra Hastings

Published by the Amercian Society For Training and Development (ASTD) this is part of their Infoline Series. Titles in the series are short, to the point, and often in point form. This one runs around 16 pages.

"Ensure the Ongoing Competitiveness of Your Organization Make Realistic Predictions About The Future Workforce and Identity the Gaps Prepare a Plan that Gets The Right People Into the Right Jobs At the Right time."

Business Succession Planning by Paul Winn

If you OWN a business, this is an important book that addresses an important issue. The first chapter begins by explaining why it's important to ensure that your business can continue without you, and then explains the how's and what's of protecting yourself, your business and your loved ones.