Training Someone To Take Over Your Job?

The concept of training someone to take over your job sounds Ludacris.  When you train someone to take over your job, it’s basically saying that you’re paving the road to get yourself fired.  Not only do you pave roads to get yourself fired, you’re setting the organization up to not suffer, while you suffer personally.  Why would anyone of us do that? 

In reality, many don’t.  When put into a position of having to train someone to take over our job, we reject it.  We may not reject training someone to take our job verbally or even obviously.  But we do so by purposely doing a terrible job at it.  We don’t put our full effort into training the candidate.  Some of us may leave certain tasks and job functions out of the training.  At times, we may train the candidate to do the job wrong intentionally.  All that sounds bad, but it’s not even the worst case scenario.  Some of us may even get vindictive and abuse the candidate because they are taking our job.  We yell at the candidate and put them down at every chance.  Sounds terrible but this is reality in many cases.

We have strong reactions when it comes to training someone to take over our job.  There are actually multiple reasons why some of us may have such strong negative reactions.  It all boils down to fear, which I’ve broken down here.

• Fear
  1. Job security – As already alluded to, we fear for or job security. We fear that if we train someone to be as capable at our job as we are, we are no longer essential to the business.  Hence we are easily dispensable to the business.  That’s why we would have such strong negative reaction to training someone to take over our job.  We want to make sure that our job is safe and our livelihood isn’t at risk.
     
     
  2. How easy the job is – This may sound silly, but it is the case for some of us. We’ve gotten so good at our job that it’s become very simple and easy for us to perform.  When we have to train someone to do our job, we may be concerned to show how easy our job is.  We may fear that others will recognize that we have an easy and cushioned job all this time.
     
     
  3. How possibly incapable you are – Many of us share this fear and insecurity. We feel like we’re not fully qualified for the position we hold.  There are areas in our job functions that we are in capable of doing.  Trying to train someone to do something we don’t really know how to do will expose the fact that we’re incapable.
     
     
  4. Others can do a better job – We all want to do our job really well and we’d like to think that no one can do our job better than we can. But what if our successor can perform our job much better than we have?  What would that say about us and our capabilities?  We certainly feel a sense of fear that others may recognize the fact that our role could have been executed better during our tenure. 
     
     

All these fears and insecurities many of us have hold us back from becoming great leaders.  While these fears are real and have prevented the proper training of successors, there are good reasons to put them aside.  There are several reasons why it’s good and beneficial to you to properly train your successor. Here I outline five top reasons why you should train someone to take over your job.

1. New opportunities – The thing about job security is that it has a negative side. When others are so dependent on you at your position and no one else can do your job, you have complete job security.  However, you will also be passed over for promotions or new opportunities.  Because there are no one else who can do your job, you cannot be taken away from your existing position for new opportunities. 
   
   
2. Others will judge – Whether you know it or not, your team members around you will recognize your behavior. When you half-heartedly train your successor, others will quickly notice your actions.  They will judge you on how unfair and unprofessional you’re actions are. 
   
   
3. Integrity – Part of the CHIE leadership culture is Integrity and how important it is to a leader. Regardless of who knows what you’re doing or who will find out, you must always maintain your integrity and perform your job to the best of your ability.  You can read more about integrity in my blog Leadership Integrity here.
   
   
4. Set the culture – As a leader, your job is to set the right culture for your team. Part of a good and healthy culture is to help and support each other to succeed and grow.  To not wholeheartedly train your successor is to undermine that culture.  Hence you would be undermining your own efforts and ability to be a good leader.
   
   
5. Recognition – When you genuinely train your successor, others will notice. Both your subordinates as well as your superiors will recognize your efforts.  You will be held in high esteem for your integrity and efforts.  This will lead to more opportunities for you to grow.
   
   

It is understandable why you would not want to train someone to take over your job.  Your job is your livelihood.  It is what’s allows you to provide for yourself as well as your family.  So to be fearful and protective of your job by not wanting to train someone to take over your job is completely understandable.  However, putting that fear aside we can see that there are good reasons why we should be training others to take over our jobs.  Don’t allow fear to dictate your actions.  Do the right thing and set yourself and your team up for success.  Leave behind a positive memory of how great of a leader you were as you head towards bigger and better opportunities.

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