Vetting for Successful Leadership Transitions
How does an organization safeguard against critics while ushering in new leadership?
The Challenge
It’s important to be mindful of the ways that your organization’s reputation can be influenced by those associated with the brand—internally and externally. Whether partnering with another organization, inviting a guest speaker to a team gathering or appointing a new leader, the actions and reputation of a person or partner can impact the reputation of your entire organization. When a faith-driven nonprofit was preparing to announce its new president, their team understood the need to closely vet the new leader’s digital footprint to help ensure it aligned with their own mission and values.
The PROCESS
To help prepare the organization to welcome their new leader, we began by conducting a comprehensive digital audit of the leader’s online presence using professional online listening software. This audit provided us with a thorough look at articles authored, past interviews and social media activity that could be layered with the insights gathered from an in-depth internal interview and assessment process.
During the vetting process, we reviewed more than a decade of online activity, relevant online mentions, news articles and previous interviews. We provided recommendations for content that should be amended, as well as privacy settings that should be changed in order to insulate the organization from anything that could detract from the brand. We also vetted all past public partnerships of the individual to help ensure they would not conflict with the organization’s mission or values.
The results
As a result of our thorough digital review and auditing process, the organization was equipped with a list of actions they could take to strengthen the leader’s online presence in preparation for the announcement. Knowing this announcement would garner attention, the organization was ultimately able to move forward with confidence in confirming their next president. By taking the extra, yet necessary, step of vetting, the organization had a successful leadership transition without any surprises or criticism.