THERE is no time to waste in the search for Singapore's next prime minister and team of political leaders, Mr Lee Hsien Loong made clear on Tuesday.

Both events are 'overdue', he said, adding that at age 56, he needed to prepare for a handover that would take place 'not so very long in the future'.

'We are doing this now because it is not early, it is time,' he said.

He also explained that those with the potential to become Singapore's future leaders need time to learn the ropes and win the trust of their peers.

He was replying to a question on leadership renewal that was posed to him at a dialogue with 120 finance and media professionals at the Thomson Reuters Newsmaker Event on Tuesday.

'We would like to have a deep bench and we need to deepen our bench,' he said.

'The way we have worked it is not to have no change, but to have change which is well prepared so that by the time it happens, it appears natural but in fact, a significant transformation has taken place,' he added.

'And that's how we moved from Lee Kuan Yew to Goh Chok Tong, and that's how we moved from Goh Chok Tong to me,' he said.

Mr Lee noted that when these handovers took place, many people said there were no surprises, but that was because a lot of work went in before.

Read the full story in Wednesday's edition of The Straits Times.