A few weeks ago, we talked about Onboarding as a KM Activity. In some ways, onboarding is A beginning of the KM process. It is not necessarily THE beginning. It is definitely one of the first steps in the knowledge management process from the user point of view.

In that same way succession planning is an ending. Succession planning is a tool which helps departments to keep their work moving forward as people come and go. We all want everything to stay the same, but if we know anything it is that only change is constant. We have to plan for the changes that will come. In this article we will talk about some steps KM people can take to prepare for inevitable changes.

The goal of succession planning is to promote smooth transitions. At many companies, contractors take a burden of work off full-time, regular employees, but their tenures are often shorter than we would like. Smooth transitions from one employee to another or from contractor to employee encourage seamless knowledge flow. Seamless knowledge flow is something we use to improve the opportunities for innovation. Innovation is what companies need to achieve success in the market. In order to maintain the programs and projects on which they have worked, we need constant knowledge flow. In order to enable constant and smooth knowledge flow, we need succession planning.

First: Plan. Think about things you picked up from your predecessor and what you needed to do to continue his or her work. Think about how you can make that transition for your successor smoother. We will discuss tacit knowledge in a future article. Transferring tacit knowledge is critical for smooth knowledge flow.

Second: Document. Create Work Aids for how to complete complicated or confusing tasks. Use the same template and precede each process title with a description such as “KM Work Aid.” This title makes finding work aids and process documents easier. Use documents, videos or any other technology that works to capture tacit knowledge.

Third: Communicate. Full text search does not always find the exact information for which we are looking. If you find information you know will be helpful to your team, put it in places where others can find it. Finding is improved when people include a ‘resource’ tab, for example, in your planning documents. Use the resource tab to link to documents that might be helpful later. This practice also provides context for related documents.

Fourth: Use the Tools. This means that you need to understand the features and functionality included in the various tools to which you have access. Using the available tools effectively can promote smooth transitions. For example, think about permissions. Decide early on what permissions your documents need for the future. If you are creating process documents, make them widely available from the start. This will save you time later because you won’t need to revisit documents and change permissions or respond to a constant stream of emailed access requests. Tending to permissions early also means that you won’t have to change the owner if you leave for your next opportunity.

Generic accounts are also a useful tool. If your department has a position that is continually filled by contractors, the transition will be smoother if a generic email account is used for certain services, such as support. Generic email accounts also help when people go on vacation, maternity leave or sabbatical. Wouldn’t it be great not to come back to a month’s worth of old help requests? Apply generic accounts to website ‘Contact Us’ links, to analytics tools/accounts and to survey forms. Generic email accounts allow teams to share the burden of a variety of tasks as well as providing context for new employees.

There are many other ideas for succession planning that can be developed using the tools you use every day.

Succession planning does not just mean that tasks are transferred to successors more quickly. Succession planning also means that you don’t have to recreate boring, but important, processes each time you perform the process or transfer the information to another person. The ultimate goal of succession planning should be to prevent or minimize interruptions. If processes are documented and processes do not require changes very often, you and your colleagues will save time, or gain time and can use that time to innovate.

-A version of this article was first published at Roche and Genentech-