Sending the Elevator Back Down
Why Mentoring Matters Now in Canada
Many of the leaders we work with are wrestling with the same uncomfortable reality: their organizations are far more vulnerable than they’d like.
Some of the more recent examples we’ve seen include:
- A Small Medium Enterprise founder who realized that years of building a successful business haven’t translated into a clear successor who shares his vision, values and appetite for the future.
- The head of a non-profit who had to step away on extended family leave and discovered there wasn’t anyone ready to carry the load, triggering a scramble that exposed how much knowledge sits in a few people’s heads.
- An organization that uses special committees whose membership turns over every three years was losing valuable knowledge that wasn’t documented or handed over. New members had to reinvent the wheel, and 12–18 months of productivity were lost each cycle.
- A string of retirements and restructuring exits that shone a light on hard-won institutional memory that was never deliberately shared or captured.
All of this sets the stage for a simple but important question for senior leaders:
If you hold valuable lessons, lived experience, and organizational context, how much of it is actually being passed on?
In this post, we explore what it really means to send the elevator back down for younger and emerging workers—and how you can do it in practical, creative ways that fit into your everyday work, not just into a formal training program or a succession plan.
When “Who’s Next” Isn’t the Same as “Who’s Ready?”
Succession and continuity planning are meant to answer two big questions:
- Who’s next?
- Will the work carry on smoothly when I’m not here?
HR processes, org charts, and talent grids can help with the first part, but they can’t, on their own, create the second.
Readiness and continuity are built in the day-to-day, through how leaders share what they know, how they think, and how they make decisions.
That’s where sending the elevator back down comes in. It’s the practical bridge between plans on paper and capability in real life. It’s leaders mentoring and knowledge sharing by:
- Exposing others to real decisions
- Sharing stories and lessons learned
- Letting people practice with support
When senior leaders invite younger or emerging leaders into the day-to-day real work they are doing three things at once:
- Succession: helping the “next” person become ready.
- Continuity: making sure critical knowledge doesn’t leave with one individual.
- Culture-building: signalling that learning, sharing, and mentoring are part of how this place works.
HR can identify the roles and risks. Leaders bring the succession plan to life by using real work as the place where future-ready leaders are grown.
Why Mentoring Matters Now
Choosing to send the elevator back down is a practical succession and continuity strategy. Mentoring and knowledge sharing turns today’s experience into tomorrow’s capability, keeping critical know how in the organization and building a stronger, more resilient bench for what’s coming next.
When knowledge, context, and decision-making stay locked in a few senior people, organizations become fragile.
When leaders intentionally open real work to others—through mentoring, involvement, and sharing—they protect the business, grow future leaders, and often improve the work itself by fueling innovation and problem-solving and fostering a culture of learning. And when people know you’re genuinely investing in them, they tend to stick around, stretch further and contribute at a higher level.
Three Practical Ways to Send the Elevator Down
Sending the elevator back down doesn’t require a big training program or a complex plan. It does ask you to pause, look at the work you’re already doing, and spot the most natural places to invite others in.
As learning and organizational development specialists, we’ve helped many leaders understand the opportunity to think more broadly about mentorship by linking it to leader development and succession planning. At the core of this work is increasing organizational awareness, engaging in collaborative problem-solving, and structuring opportunities to learn in a supportive environment on real work.
Here are 3 ways you can get started:
1Pause and deliberately scan your organization
Take a step back and ask:
- What things do we need our people to understand so they can contribute more broadly?
- Where are we most at risk if one person walks out the door?
- How might we bring experience and learning to others through work we’re already doing?
2Identify practical low-lift starting points
Look for invitations you can extend quickly, such as:
- Ride-alongs: invite emerging talent into key meetings, strategy sessions, or problem-solving workshops – first as observers, then as contributors
- Lessons learned: run short debriefs at major milestones and include people who weren’t directly involved so they can hear the story. Recording these sessions can create a simple video library of “how we do things around here”
- Learning circles or Communities of practice: bring people in similar roles, or from across functions together to share what they’re doing, what’s working and what they’re learning
3Get creative and, where it fits, seek structured help
Sometimes you find yourself in the messy middle of a challenge too heavy to carry on your own. That’s where a more structured approach can help you send the elevator back down and move real work forward, for example:
- Breakthrough Sprint: A time-bound, facilitated conversation built around one real challenge you’re carrying. You bring the context and the people; we bring the container, questions, and tools. Together, you solve a real issue while your people practice collaborative problem-solving and deepen their understanding of your business.
- ThinkUP Framework: If you and your team are responsible for leading change, innovation or cross-functional collaboration, this program teaches a clear, repeatable process for tackling real business challenges—so you develop your people as you do the work.
- Custom training with mentoring built in: If there are gaps in your workforce, a custom training solution that includes mentoring or a small training pilot can help you test “sending the elevator back down.”
What if you sent the elevator back down?
If you’re uncomfortable seeing senior knowledge walk out the door and successors who aren’t quite ready, you don’t have to solve it on your own.
This is the work we do: helping leaders turn everyday work into a practical system for mentoring, knowledge, and building a stronger bench. If you want to explore how sending the elevator back down could look in your organization – without a big program or a big budget, call me and let’s design it together.
Book a 30-minute discovery call with Janice to get started.
References:
[1] 2025 Environics Institute, Future Skills Centre, and Diversity Institute: Mentorship in the workplace: Employee participation and perspectives Most Canadian Businesses lack mentorship programs, losing institutional knowledge
