For the real estate professionals we cover in our various products (as a reminder, Real Estate Forum has a market-leading 54,000 qualified subscribers; GlobeSt.com garners 800,000 page views per month; and the RealShare Conference Series pulls in more than 6,000 attendees annually. Just saying. . .) success can be measured in a number of ways: Income, Roster of Done Deals, Title.

Where we as an industry fall down, it seems, is in what we’ll call the flow of human capital—succession planning at one end of the spectrum and, at the other, mentoring the next generation of rising stars. ULI and Russell Reynolds recently surveyed industry chieftains and discovered that “89% of senior executives queried do not have adequate CEO succession plans, and nearly one-third do not feel confident that their firm could immediately select a new CEO if necessary.”

ULI chairman Peter Rummell brought up a sensible rationale for this serious failure to prepare talent for the inevitable absence of current leadership: the old-school cowboy mentality is still very much at play . . . though he said it more nicely: “These are firms headed by one man or woman and if, let’s call him Fred, is not concerned about picking a successor, then it won’t happen.” He also credited the lack of bench strength brought upon by the recent economic unpleasantness.

At the other end of the career spectrum, young brokers I’ve spoken with have noted the lack of formal mentoring programs in even the biggest commercial real estate firms. As one up-and-comer told me, mentoring is largely left to the mentee. Short of a company arming new entrants with that vital developmental tool , they’re left to their own devices and have to develop their own mentors, from within and without the company they work for, from within and without the industry they work for, anyone who they feel has the qualities they admire.

The way I read this, there’s a real shortage of companies that are planning for their long-range future. We’re neither planning for a smooth transition as the old guard fades away nor planting the seeds to actively grow talent from within our ranks. It’s a great example of building your house on a bed of sand.

So two questions: Does your company have a succession plan? And how do you handle the training and mentoring of young staff? Click here and let me know.