Volume 65 December 2026-January 2026 : Mokanoki

 In this issue let us examine the word succession. Remember we are talk about mentorship. I must admit from the word go that Myles Munroe, the international motivational speaker I always quote in a number of my articles, says Succession is an amazing word. Munroe says: “It begins with the very concept of success.

Success has to do with movement. It has to do with continuity. Successful succession guarantees continuity.” Therefore, according to him succession means to “follow after,” but the definitions of “succeed” in some dictionaries even puts the sense of “following” before the idea of doing well. Etymologists tell us that the word succeed comes from ancient terms that mean to “follow” or “go under”.

With that explanation in mind one can conclude that success itself has to do with advancing towards something, and for the most part, many of us think of success as “I establish a goal. I move toward the goal, and I accomplish the goal. I am finished.” In a very simplistic sense, that is true. You decide you want to build a house, and you start the design, you build it, and now thatitisfinished,youreceivethekey. Youcouldcallthatsuccess. O reka dikgomo di a tsala o bo o re jaanong ke monna tota but succession preserves success.

Let us all admit the fact that we normally think of success as having to do with pursuing, achieving, and concluding something. According to Munroe’s school of thought success implies moving, advancing, continuing. Succession is the perpetuation of purpose. Purpose is your assignment. We can simple call that your assignment in life.

Succession is protecting your assignment beyond your lifetime. Succession preserves all ofyourworkafteryouretireordie. Successionisthetransitionof the leader’s purpose, content, character, standards, values, morals, and qualities to succeeding generations. Succession first involves transferring your vision to another generation of leaders. That is a hard thing to do.

All I am trying to say here is that succession means you must transfer your way of thinking to another person. That requires a lot of intimate time together. To effect the vision transfer, the mentor must devote time to the potential successor.

The vision must live on even if you die. If your vision dies with you, you failed. I have seen unfinished churches overgrown with grass. I have seen people who had more than thousand herds of cattle today their children are as poor as a church mouse. I know of people who were leading business people in my village today. Their wealth has vanished in the thin air. Why? The answer is simple. It is because the leader failed.

Crowds came to see their ‘success’ and people shouted, admired them, some even praised them but no one carried on and completed their tabernacle. As Munroe puts it, the weeds that choke the unfinished dreams will always expose failure. Unfinished monuments are a sign of failure, telltale signs that you did not mentor and invest in the right thing, the people for whom you were responsible. Let us end here for now. In the next issue we are going to finish this definition of the world succession.

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