Leadership Transition occurs when a leader moves from one's current role to a new role. Watkins (2003) defined leader transitions as a period of transitions from one leadership role to another. 

Different types of Transition

There are two different types of leadership transitions- Internal and External. The internal transition occurs when an existing leader moves to another role/business unit within the organization. In internal transition, the leader understands the organization's culture, ethos and values as well as the context, business, and strategy. They already have workplace relationships within the organization. External transitions are where leaders do not have any form of experience with the organization. They are entirely new to the organization. External transitions are perceived to be difficult compared to internal transition. As per the McKinsey report 2018, 79% of external and 69% of internal hires report that implementing culture change is difficult. 

Leadership transitions are not without challenges. These are the times when a leader is under intense scrutiny, creating impressions and establishing credibility is paramount.   

Leadership Transition and its impact

Empirical research suggests that during a conversation with top leaders, professional transitions to new roles, organizations, and critical roles were typically called out as high-stakes, high-tension events when asked to rank life's challenges in order of difficulty. If the transition succeeds, the organization's probability of being positively impacted is high and vice versa. McKinsey report,2018 says that nine out of ten teams whose leader has a successful transition go on to meet their 3-year performance goals. Moreover, the attrition risk for each team is 13% lower, their level of discretionary effort is 2% higher, and they generate 5% more revenue and profit than average. However, when leaders struggle through a transition, the performance of their DR is 15% lower than that of high-performing leaders. The DRs are 30% more likely to be disengaged or leave the organization.

Challenges in Leadership Transitions-

McKinsey 2018 report suggests that 2 years after executive transitions, between 27 and 46% of them are regarded as failures or disappointments. These matters are not problems only for leaders who come from the outside. Irrespective of the type of transitions, we must consider that the senior leaders have demonstrated success and showed intelligence, initiative and results in their previous roles. The pace and magnitude of change are constantly rising in the business world. 

1. One of the leading causes of failed Leadership Transitions is the challenge of cultural and context orientation. Research findings suggest that 68% of transitions are challenging due to politics, culture, and people-related issues. 67% of leaders wish they had moved faster to change the culture. 
2. Meeting expectations: Leaders are experiencing internal and external turmoil as they try to meet the expectations of the organization, function, team, and themselves. A study by the Centre for Creative Leadership and Manchester Partners International (as cited in Bradt et al.,2006) suggested that most companies provided little support for leader transitions.

Research suggests that many organizations approach a leader transition as mergers, acquisitions, and one-off events. The typical unsystematic hands-off transition approach relies heavily on new leaders to self-manage their transitions. However, most leaders experience only a handful of transitions. So, for them, each transition remains more art than science.

Key imperatives of a successful leadership transition

At an enterprise level

Organizations invest heavily in leadership development and succession planning. They have a structured development agenda with several interventions to prepare leaders for critical roles. However, after a leader's transition to another role, little attention or structure is paid to the transition.

 Organizations have their induction and buddy programs, and they have expectations from HR to do more. However, the most significant aspect is clarity of role and expectations from the manager and senior leader (CEO). It is also important to understand the expectations of the team. While it is easy to blame the leader for being unsuccessful, it also reflects the way the organization navigates him/her across the organization and sets him/her up for failure. Organizations are agile, and their expectation from the leader is speed. At the same time, giving time to a leader to unlearn and learn is crucial. The manager plays a significant role during the transition. He/she will help the new leader to be sensitive to the organizational context, culture, values, and ethos. He/she also helps build workplace relationships with critical stakeholders and the team. 

New Manager Assimilation is an initiative that aligns the team with the new leader. It is a systematic way to seek feedback from the team and align the team while building and sustaining strong relationships. 

At an individual level

Change is the surrounding ecosystem, culture, context, and values; however, transition is mainly internal (psychological). Leadership transition requires introspection, reflection and awareness in a leader to be successful in the new role. Every leader wants to learn the nuances of the new role as soon as possible; however, it should be timely. It is important to unlearn before learning. As individuals, we all have set patterns to work. The purpose is to pause and reflect, ensuring unlearning first and then learning and adapting to the current context. Research suggests that 92% of external and 72% of internal hires take more than 90 days to reach total productivity. 62% of external and 25% of internal hires admit it took them at least 6 months to have a real impact. An ideal transition period varies from 6 to 9 months.  

It is important to unlearn before learning

The Marathon Effect

Leading Transition: A New Model for Change by Willian Bridges and Susan Mitchell, 2000

1. Ending, Losing, Letting go-Ending encompasses letting go of old assumptions and beliefs. Unlearning is more difficult than learning. This phase is all about making oneself ready for new situations. It requires a lot of struggle and effort to suspend what was familiar and effectively move towards transition. 
2. The Neutral Zone: The neutral zone is the core of the transition. It is about replacing old behaviors with new ones and demonstrating adaptability in the enterprise context, culture, and values. Beiges (2003) states that the neutral zone is the most challenging part of a transition. It's a phase when a leader experiences uncertainty, anxiety, and a feeling of isolation. It’s a phase where the leader has unlearned and moved towards learning as per the organization's ethos. A sense of realization that the ways of working, competencies and skills have to be ended, build and adapt. 
3. New Beginning: Some leaders fail in phase 1 of ending, where it is difficult to let go of their behavioral patterns. Few leaders succeed in phase 2 as they get frustrated, anxious, and confused by the neutral zone and rush to move out of the phase. Some, however, after successfully moving to the third phase, are required to behave in a new way and put one's sense of competence and value at risk. This phase also might require leaders to be vulnerable as they worry about their credibility and consequences. This phase consists of action and demonstration of acquired contextual competencies, stakeholder management, skills, communication and influencing skills which initially might not come effortlessly from the leader. It may require a leader to be conscious and consistent in ways of working. 

Enablers contributing towards successful transition

1. The way organizations invest thoughtfully in the development and readiness of leaders, they should equally invest in the leadership transition. Clear briefing and expectation mapping, role clarity, and calling out short-term and long-term goals will set up the new leader for success. Shadowing a predecessor or an identified already seasoned leader in the system will help the new leader understand the uncalled nuances of work relationships and avoid any traps. New Manager Assimilation will significantly help new leaders communicate openly and build transparency within the team. It can help the leader as well as the team to arrive on the same page and work towards organizational outcomes
2. Balance between old and new: While a new leader knows what to do, knowing what not to do is inevitable. Every leader in a new role, function or organization wants to change team members, processes, tools and bring in newness. It is when they need to be clear of their strategic intent. Something that might have worked for a new leader in the past may not work in the current context. Therefore, while bringing new initiatives and processes, one must be cognizant of the current organizational perspective. Everything new and doing everything in one go can bring disruption and make people uncomfortable. A leader must bring a delicate balance between old and new. The leader also must manage polarities in the function and team. E.g., Decision of centralization vs decentralization, integration vs differentiation, change vs stability. 
3. Building and strengthening work relationships: A new leader must comfort the team. Instead of sharing what is incorrect, the focus should be on what can be better. The new leader should build a culture of psychological safety and spend time knowing the team and their aspirations as well as contributions. There should be an open environment for sharing ideas, opinions and candid conversations. The relationships will be built within the team,  manager, peers and cross-functional teams. Understanding their expectations and one's contribution while working with them is adequate. It is also about knowing what works well and building on it thoughtfully.

 One way of building successful work relationships is implementing 4 P's. 

Leadership transition can be successful through the efforts of an organization and an individual. Organizations should acknowledge various transition phases and provide the leader space to experience them. The leader needs to make a reasonable "leap of faith” into a period of change and realignment. Effective transition takes courage, patience, and endurance. Effective transition is working with people.