Succession28 Aug 2026
The Succession Gap: 2026 Regional Board Survey
61% of boards we surveyed have no ready-now internal successor for the CEO seat. The reasons are structural, not individual.
We asked 214 boards across Indonesia, Singapore and Malaysia a single question: if your chief executive left this quarter, who takes the seat on Monday?
Sixty-one per cent could not name an internal candidate they considered ready now. That figure has barely moved in four years, and the explanation is rarely about the individuals in the pipeline.
Where the gap actually forms
The constraint is structural. Successors are grown in roles that carry real profit-and-loss accountability, and most regional groups have concentrated that accountability in two or three seats. A pipeline cannot be deeper than the number of jobs that develop it.
What the strongest boards do differently
They treat succession as an operating decision reviewed quarterly, not a governance artefact reviewed annually — and they are willing to move a candidate sideways into a smaller, messier business to find out what they are made of.
More insights
Where Strategy Dies: The Middle Management Problem
Strategy rarely fails at the top. It loses meaning in the translation layer — and that layer is measurable.
Hybrid, Three Years On
What the data now says about proximity, trust and promotion velocity in regional organisations.
The First External CEO: What Actually Changes
Our 2026 research question, examined across the client base and a panel of 1,200 regional executives.