Boston – September 15, 2026 -- Just 40% of organizations say they are effective at building sufficient bench strength for critical roles, according to a global survey of nearly 800 business and HR leaders by the Institute for Corporate Productivity (i4cp).
Bench strength drives nearly 7x higher succession success
Organizations that excel at building bench strength are more than 2.5 times as likely to be high-performance organizations and nearly 7 times as likely to report successful succession outcomes, the study found. Yet the report, titled "The New Rules of Succession Management: A Blueprint for Future-Ready Organizations," concludes that many companies confuse succession activity—talent reviews, leadership programs, readiness plans—with actual leadership depth.
Succession planning remains disconnected from business strategy
Only 18% of respondents say succession is highly integrated with enterprise business planning, and just 14% report strong integration with strategic workforce planning. Tom Stone, Senior Research Analyst at i4cp and report co-author, said effort and infrastructure alone do not create bench strength; stronger systems connect succession work to strategy and keep readiness current as business needs shift.
High performers extend succession far beyond the C-suite
High-performance organizations are 2.5 times more likely than lower-performing peers to include mid-level managers in formal succession processes, eight times more likely to include entry-level and frontline managers, and twice as likely to include critical non-managerial roles, the survey found.
AI readiness lags in leadership evaluation criteria
Only 16% of respondents say their organizations place high emphasis on evaluating leadership candidates' willingness to experiment with and use AI, despite the capability's link to broader measures of future readiness. High-performance organizations are five times more likely to integrate succession with business planning, nearly twice as likely to assess candidates against future role requirements, and almost twice as likely to use data and analytics in succession decisions.
Report issues 12 recommendations to strengthen leadership pipelines
Recommendations include connecting succession directly to business strategy, expanding planning beyond the C-suite, using talent pools instead of single successors, developing leaders through critical experiences, and applying data and AI while retaining human accountability. Heather Foust-Cummings, Ph.D., Vice President and Senior Research Analyst at i4cp, said the risk is not that a successor is missing when a leader departs, but that the business may lack leadership capacity when strategy shifts or disruption accelerates.
The study is based on a global survey of 759 business and HR leaders, supported by interviews with senior HR and talent executives. i4cp will host a public webinar on September 23 at 1:00 p.m. ET with the lead researchers to discuss the findings.