The Baton Problem

From The Editor

By Matt Green

Leadership succession is often framed in a familiar metaphor: one generation hands the baton to the next. The assumption beneath that metaphor is straightforward—someone is waiting, eager to run.

But as Generation Z enters the workforce in growing numbers, that assumption is proving less reliable than we thought. Just one data point in many that tell the same story, Deloitte Global’s 2025 Gen Z and Millennial Survey revealed that only 6% of Gen Zs say their primary career goal is to reach a senior leadership position.

This should not be misinterpreted as ambivalence toward growth and meaningful work. It may mean Gen Z is intentionally avoiding traditional management positions they associate with stress and burnout.

If younger leaders seem reluctant to move toward leadership, it is worth asking whether the roles themselves still fit the world they are entering. Many leadership positions were designed for a different era—one with clearer boundaries, slower decision cycles and far less public exposure.

Today’s leaders are expected to be always on, emotionally available, strategically decisive and publicly accountable, often without the authority or support to match those demands. What once looked like influence now looks like perpetual strain.

What some may interpret as a lack of ambition could simply be a sober assessment of cost. In today’s environment, opting out can look less like disengagement and more like discernment. Choosing not to lead may be, for some, a rational response to what leadership currently requires.

It’s worth noting that this tension is not new. Moses did not simply hand off leadership to a younger version of himself. The role he occupied—leading a wandering people through crisis and formation—was not the same role Israel needed once they stood at the edge of the Promised Land. Joshua was not asked to inherit Moses’ authority so much as to exercise a redefined form of leadership, shaped for a different moment and a different future. Succession required more than a willing successor; it required a reimagined role.

Moses and Joshua led in profoundly different ways, not because one was stronger or more faithful, but because the moment demanded it. Moses guided a people being formed—through crisis, complaint and constant uncertainty. Joshua led a people being settled, charged with stewardship, boundaries and continuity. What had once required prophetic authority now required disciplined execution. Succession did not mean replication; it required redefinition.

That pattern repeats across history. Every generation eventually discovers that it cannot simply inherit authority—it must renegotiate it. Leadership does not transfer cleanly when the context has changed. When institutions assume continuity where adaptation is required, frustration grows on both sides of the exchange: older leaders unsure why the baton is not being grasped, and younger leaders hesitant to accept something that no longer fits.

The leadership challenge of this moment, then, may be deeper than succession planning. It may be an invitation to reexamine what kind of leadership we are actually forming people for. Until that question is answered honestly, the baton will continue to hover, uncertain, between outstretched hands.

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Matt Green is the editorial director for AVAIL Journal. He also serves as vice president of marketing for Pioneers, a global church-planting organization based in Orlando, Florida. He lives in Central Florida with his wife, Andy. They have four children and one grandchild.