Succeeding a charismatic leader is not easy – people in the organization admired, respected, and in some cases loved your predecessor. What can you, as the successor, do?

First you need to realize and accept the fact that you cannot and should not try to compete with or try to be like the charismatic leader you succeeded. All leaders are different and it is impossible and impractical to compete with or try to be like your predecessor.

Instead, you have to communicate a few key messages to the organization:

To paraphrase the line by Mark Anthony upon the murder of Julius Caesar (“I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him.”), I come to follow him, not to replace him.

This means that you identify and acknowledge the foundation laid by your predecessor and the attributes and characteristics that led to that success. Celebrate the contribution of your predecessor and acknowledge his or her best qualities, those remembered and cherished by others.

After acknowledging the foundation laid by your predecessor, clearly identify both the next steps to build upon that foundation and the obstacles or challenges that you see ahead. This serves a dual purpose. It positions you as someone who is continuing on the path set by your predecessor while simultaneously identifying the factors that make the circumstances you face different, thereby allowing you to set the stage for where you will lead the business.

These are not easy or simple things to do. This requires a thoughtful and comprehensive understanding of where the business is now, what is possible in the future, what the best steps are for moving forward, and what gets in the way of that progress.

Then, identify the attributes and characteristics that enable you to lead the organization forward and describe your leadership in clear and understandable terms. This lets the rest of the organization know how you are different from your predecessor. It is important that everyone knows what to expect from you so that they don’t assume or hope, as so often happens, that you will be like the person you succeeded.

Communicating these key messages will help you to follow a charismatic leader, not by trying to replace or compete with what came before, but by honoring the foundation laid, by identifying the road ahead, and by clarifying who you are as a leader and how you are different from your predecessor.

I’m captivated by political cartoons, in large part, because of their ability to say a lot with pictures and so few words. As a consultant, speaker, and author, I know how hard it is to get a message across. It’s exceedingly hard to do it concisely.

The effectiveness of political cartoons depends upon the cartoonist identifying and portraying the essence of a person in pictures and a few words. Their skill is evident when we, as observers, accept their caricatures as accurate representations of what the person is really like.

Cartoonists, when they’re good, help us to see others for what they are. They help us to see the essential characteristics of people – the key aspects of a personality that help us to understand others better.

What would a cartoonist portray about you as a leader? What essential characteristics would be identified and communicated?

An organization’s culture has its advantages and its disadvantages. On the plus side, when an element of organizational culture supports the organization in its efforts to do good work, it’s a definite advantage.

Think about such things as a sincere commitment to customer service, working as long as it takes to get the job done, or never ending until the job is done right, and you have an idea of how an element of culture is advantageous.

On the other hand, there are less positive cultural elements, too. For example, organizations that allow individual business units unfettered independence to the point where those units have redundant systems and conflicting programs that cost the overall business money and time are at a distinct disadvantage.

Or, organizations that have allowed “niceness” to expand to the point that no one tells the truth for fear of hurting someone’s feelings have institutionalized another disadvantageous cultural element.

The best leaders learn to recognize both the advantages and disadvantages of their organizational cultures. What are the plusses and minuses of your culture?