succeeding

1. 1
   verb

   Present participle of succeed.

   He is succeeding where many others have failed.

   The team is succeeding beyond expectations this season.

   Note

   Both halves of succeed run through this form, and the construction tells them apart. With a direct object it means following or replacing (succeeding her father as head of the firm). With to it means coming into a title or possession (succeeding to the throne). Standing alone, as in he is succeeding where others failed, it means achieving. The same spelling also serves the adjective 'next in order'.

   She is succeeding her father as head of the firm.

   On his brother's death he found himself succeeding to the throne.

2. 2
   adjective

   Coming after and next in order; following the one before.

   The succeeding paragraphs explain the theory in greater detail.

   In succeeding generations, the old tradition slowly faded away.

   Similarfollowing, subsequent, later, next

   Oppositepreceding, previous, prior, earlier

   Note

   An adjective of order, not of achievement: the succeeding chapters are simply the ones that come next, not the ones that went well. It draws on the 'follow' side of succeed rather than the 'prosper' side, both of which the verb's -ing form can carry. It sits before its noun, as in Robert W. Chambers's The Younger Set (1907), and takes no degrees: nothing is more succeeding than anything else.

3. 3
   noununcountable

   The fact of achieving what one set out to do; success.

   His repeated succeeding in difficult ventures earned him wide respect.

   Their succeeding depended on careful planning and a little luck.

   Similarsuccess

   Oppositefailure

   Note

   A noun that could be counted, unlike the gerund: Wits Common-wealth (1722) advises a man in adversity to hope 'for better succeedings', setting the plural against 'a Ruin'. Here the word names outcomes or fortunes that turn out well. The plural succeedings is the clearest sign that this is the noun rather than the verb's -ing form, which never takes an -s.

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