A CEO has to give directions to all the organizational actions and be responsible for the overall results.

 

THE  TEETHING TROUBLES

OF A FIRST- TIME  CEO

 

 

Roles of CEOs are becoming a vast and critical subject in the realm of management with lots of potential for further research due to severe global competitions, unwieldy growth and interdependency, greater awareness and expectations on the parts of customers and stake holders (including share holders) and much sharper public eye of surveillance over the corporations. Accelerated rate of change and its enormity compel CEOs not to make mistakes on one hand and on the other, become more effective and more precise.

 

The CEO is becoming more and more accountable not only for the short term impact he creates but also for the long term implications even after he has long gone. A good CEO should be able to shape up the future of the company. He is supposed to provide a body and character to the organization he leads and help sustain them in great shape and spirit. A CEO has to give directions to all the organizational actions and be responsible for the overall results. He has to set a tone to build up an ethically and legally sound organization and oversee that it remains so all the time. Wrong decisions and actions of CEOs can harm a large body of humanity these days, in several countries, at the same time (example: the recession of 2008-2010).

 

Putting it all together, CEO should provide the right kind of leadership to lead the organization strategically, commercially, morally and people-wise and bring about the right balance among all of them. There are tomes of research and analysis on the Qualities and Competencies to Become Successful CEO. While most appear to be moralizing and motherhood statements we have found value in them to groom  young scions and fast track managers to be spotted for higher responsibility live SBU Heads. A trend in leading companies is to have a talent pipeline The best advice we have received is from  Mr A M Naik the Chairman of Larsen and Toubro; one of India’s best managed and successful conglomerate.

“Start thinking and behaving like a CEO at whatever level you are at present. Everyone is really a CEO of his own job.

 If he starts handling his job the way a CEO handles the corporation,

he shows a definite potential of a future CEO of a company.”

 

I summarize below a few distilled thoughts to be a checklist for you:

·        CEO should have the competency of looking at the “whole”: outside of the company and inside of the company. He should be able to assimilate and link together the entire factors of business: people, economy, governments, markets, customers, employees, technology, business associates and the lot. CEO’s assumptions or paradigms about each of these factors should be correct; otherwise there would surely be problem(s) for the company in the future.

 

·        CEO should have a great vision. He should be able to foresee what is good for the organization and what is not and organize the necessary decisions and actions. He should be able to ask questions like what the company’s business should be and what it should not be and then, should be able to find the right answers.

 

 

·        CEO has to be very courageous. Having envisioned the changes needed, he should have sufficient guts to lead those changes.

 

·        CEO cannot just have only result orientation. Equally important is his process orientation. The two together set tone for long term as well as short term successes.

  ·        CEO should be great in strategic planning and goal setting. Setting up of the strategies and goals for the organization gives the road maps, mile stones and destinations as an effective guide to its people.

·        CEO should be able to communicate with all sorts of people everywhere, effectively. It includes his convincing and influencing abilities. It includes his keen listening abilities and interpersonal relations. It includes his consensus and team building skills.

 

With best wishes

Dr Wilfred Monteiro

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

CEO PITFALLS once at the peak , there’s no more to learn, and a CEO may quietly stop learning

 

HOW CEOs FALL 

FROM THEIR HIGH PEAK  

It is lonely at the top. success can become a self delusion. You may begin with a theory that what methods and thinking brought you to this level of success will take you further to the next level. Or you may delude yourself into copying someone's success model only to find to late that it does not fit. Or you may simply repeat the three common mistakes which have pulled down many kings from their throne. 

 PITFALL NO 1 #  A CEO can become arrogant by externalizing blame

Having no day-to-day accountability for her actions can also turn a CEO sour. When things go wrong, she can blame everyone around her without facing her own shortcomings. “My employees just don’t get it,” proclaims the CEO, never thinking for a moment that she is the one who hired them. Did she hire incompetents? Or has she failed to communicate goals consistently and clearly? “Market conditions have changed.” she declares. A nice excuse, but isn’t it the CEO’s job to anticipate the market and position the company for success under a variety of scenarios? Without someone to keep her honest, she can gradually absolve herself of all responsibility.

 

PITFALL NO 2#  Believing in a title can lead to overconfidence

Arrogance also threatens a CEO. “Because I am CEO, I must know the business better than anyone else.” It has been said, but it just isn’t true. No CEO can be an expert in all functional areas. A CEO who is doing her job is spending time with the big picture. If she knows the details better than her employees, she’s either hiring the wrong people or spending her time at the wrong levels of the organization. It’s appropriate for a CEO to manage operations if absolutely necessary, but she should quickly hire good operational managers and return to leading the whole business.

 

PITFALL NO 3 #CEOs can stop learning well

Of course, once infallible, there’s no more to learn, and a CEO may quietly stop learning. Without daily oversight and high quality feedback on how she does her job, she can mistakenly believe her actions lead to success. In reality, she may be doing the wrong thing, but her staff may be working around the clock to cover for her.

 

 

THE WAY AHEAD

The difference between first place and second place is all the little things that add up to be big things on the BIG scoreboard. There is just a hair splitting difference between the winner and runner-up in the 100 meter Olympic dash.  So refine and nurture your talents and strengths. Giving your best on a bad day is better than giving nothing on a good day Super-achievers take calculated risks and step out of your comfort zone. Train your mind to make decisions quickly but with due diligence. Listen to your intuition. Super-achievers have a well defined “inner voice” what psychologists call the self-talk. It’s a hidden tape-recorder you have within you to motivate or de-motivate you in those critical moments. Only 3% of people set goals and they are the super-achievers & peak performers. They set goals that are specific, measurable, attainable, realistic, and have time frame set for achievement. With each goal, take time to set a plan of action.

 

Here is a mind workshop to keep you awake at night ! 

Ask yourself and think deeply - What are 5 things you can do today to take a step in the direction of your dream for yourself and your company ???

With best wishes

Dr Wilfred Monteiro

 

THE FOUR STEPS TOWARDS BECOMING A SUCCESSFUL CEO

 

THE FOUR  STEPS TOWARDS

 BECOMING  A  SUCCESSFUL CEO

The challenge now lies in how to convert all this into a roadmap for success in the first year of being a CEO. It was easier being a head-of-department but now to take charge of a whole company or SBU is a quick rise in your horizon levels  Let us begin step by step... Ram Charan world renowned management guru summarizes  it all  in one statement

“The leader must be in charge of getting things done by running

the three core processes—picking other leaders,

setting the strategic direction, and conducting operations.” 

STEP 1.  MAGNIFY  THE ORGANIZATION VISION &  MISSION

A CEO needs to seek different perspectives and channel all of them to the chosen corporate mission. This trait is conspicuous in CEOs who monitor trends affecting organizations, grasp changes in the environment, encourage employees to contribute ideas that could improve performance, accurately differentiate between important and unimportant issues, and give the appropriate weight to stakeholder concerns. Leaders who do well on this dimension typically base their decisions on sound analysis and avoid the many biases to which complex decisions are prone.

 

Successful CEO’s make the most of their talent for using fact-based analysis to spot industry shifts and to understand their own companies’ sources of competitive advantage as a foundation for clear, differentiated strategies. Organic growth is a core concern, and driving business performance to meet tough organic targets is a critical part of the architect’s role. By monitoring competitors, these strategists can challenge their own organizations to set ambitious targets and reach them. Successful CEO’s  also focus on driving mergers and acquisitions, divestitures, joint ventures, and other opportunities. They may “own” the deal-sourcing and integration teams and work to find the right acquisition targets in line with a strategic vision.

 

Leadership isn’t really about you; it is about the direction you are leading people towards. If you can’t be fully invested in that destination, you may be in the wrong place. If you want people who understand the mission and purpose of your organization and will invest their time, talent and heart into their work, how can you expect it if they don’t see it from you?Yes, you must be able to communicate the mission and purpose clearly, but it is far more important that people see you living it first. As always, people watch your feet, more than your lips. If you want more commitment from your team, start with yourself.If you aren’t fully committed to your organization, ask yourself what you could do to change that. If you don’t believe you can, you owe it to yourself, your team and the organization to find someplace else to lead.

 

STEP 2. LEVERAGE YOUR TOP MANAGEMENT TALENT

Successful CEO’s are leaders who are supportive understand and sense how other people feel. By showing authenticity and a sincere interest in those around them, they build trust and inspire and help colleagues to overcome challenges. They intervene in group work to promote organizational efficiency, allaying unwarranted fears about external threats and preventing the energy of employees from dissipating into internal conflict. Experience shows that different business situations often require different styles of leadership. For organizations investing in the development of their future leaders, prioritizing these four areas is a good place to start.

Leadership isn’t only about you, it is about the people that you are leading. If you don’t believe in and can’t be committed to them and their success, you are likely in the wrong job.While this commitment is most directly about those who “report” to you, depending on your situation, the group of individuals you need to be committed to might be broader and larger than that. Due to your role, the organization has entrusted you to get a return on the investment made each day in your team. If you want to think about it transactionally, you are responsible for getting high productivity, quality, safety and more. More holistically, you are responsible for making these resources more valuable through their development, and growth.This isn’t just sound-good, feel-good advice from me – there is an organizational responsibility to be a great steward of your human resources.You can’t or won’t do any of these things nearly well enough unless your commitment to them and their success is high.

 

STEP 3 .COMMITMENT TO  EXCELLENCE IN EXECUTION

 

Operating with a strong results orientation. Leadership is about not only developing and communicating a vision and setting objectives but also following through to achieve results. Leaders with a strong results orientation tend to emphasize the importance of efficiency and productivity and to prioritize the highest-value work.In the final analysis, it is results that count; the best vision, strategy and operating plans are useless if they are not diligently executed.  Fulfilling the role of follow-through in a structured, thorough way involves five steps:

·         setting milestones for key operating plan deliverables;

·         measuring results against those milestones;

·         analyzing any results that fall short of the milestones;

·         prescribing corrective actions;

·         and updating the operating plan. 

 

One of the key benefits of a structured and thorough follow-through approach is that it serves as an early warning system for your company which will dramatically increase the odds for effective execution.

STEP 4. INVESTMENT IN YOURSELF

While Leadership is about the organizational outcomes and other people’s, paradoxically you can’t leave yourself out of the equation. If you want to serve the organization and your team, you must be committed to yourself too. In this light, how many of the following questions can you answer in the affirmative?

1. Am I the type of CEO I admire in others?
2. Am I building a personal foundation of inspired Leadership?
3. Am I aware of my personal Leadership impact on others?Are you willing to invest of your time and energy to get better at the challenging role of Leadership?

 Leadership is an act of selflessness, but you can’t serve others if you don’t take care of yourself too. Your commitment to yourself matters greatly, but only in the context of the other two commitments. You might feel I have left other commitments out – and while I agree there may be many other things or people you might need to be committed to, my goal has been to highlight the most important and those that apply to you regardless of your industry, position or situation.

With best wishes

Dr Wilfred Monteiro

CEO SUCCESS - SIX CAPS THE CEO MUST WEAR

 

CEO SUCCESS :  DIFFERENT CAPS FOR THE  COMPLEX STRATEGY GAME

 

Finally, the CEO must be effective in performing six versatile role  To produce exceptional results, the CEO must understand how to perform all six roles well and must recognize that five-out-of-six is not good enough.

 

 CREATING THE VISION

Too many CEOs allow themselves to get drawn in to the maze of day-to-day firefighting – we call this working in the business.  On the other hand, outstanding CEOs make the time to rise above the firefighting and focus on the big picture – we call this working on the business.  From personal experience and in working with others, we have found that there are six core roles that the most effective CEOs perform on a consistent basis..

And CEOs don’t have a choice when it comes to their responsibilities – they must see that all are done and done well.  There is no one to pick up the slack if the CEO does not tend to them. We can help ensure that these responsibilities are effectively executed. 

 

To lead, a CEO must first define a unifying direction for the company.  Choosing the right vision and expressing it with clarity is the first challenge of true leadership.  A well crafted vision statement forces the CEO and management team to come to grips with a number of subtle, but very important considerations: the vision statement should identify what is unique about your company; it should guide the activities of all employees; it should inspire them to choose to work for your company and give their all; and it should be stated in such a way that you can measure progress and know when you have achieved your vision.


There are fundamental rules of markets and competition, and there are inherent capabilities and limitations of any organization -- together these make some visions attainable while others are not.  The CEO needs to be able to articulate a strategy for achieving that vision in light of the overall market, the company’s position, the competition, as well as other potentially significant factors, such as macro-economic conditions, politics, and regulatory constraints.  At the core of your strategy should be a path that creates a position of true competitive advantage.

While the CEO must ensure that there is a logically tight strategy, it is also important to make certain that the basic precepts of strategic thought permeate the whole organization from top to bottom.  Strategic thought is not just a top level concept, but it should be present at every level in the organization.

BUIDLING THE TOP-DECK PLAYERS:

Without the team to implement them, a well developed vision and a logically sound strategy are merely concepts, and every experienced CEO understands that success depends on the strength of the team.  While high performance teams begin with strong talent, they must be shaped through the creation of an environment that values the contribution of individuals, sets expectations for performance, operates based on sound decision making processes, and motivates team members to give their all for the objectives of the company.  

DRAWING THE ROADMAP:

For the strategy to be effective it must guide all the decisions and actions of the company, and it is the translation of the strategy into a more detailed operating plan that ensures that result.  The operating plan consists of a set of specific actions with quantifiable results, including milestones and timelines, and identifies key risks and contingency plans for the higher risk items.  It is most important that the set of actions prescribed by the operating plan, when achieved, ensures the achievement of the strategy.  The operating plan is also the basis for resource allocation, and as such, budgets should follow the development of the operating plan.  The real value of the operating plan is to focus your team selectively on those activities which are the most valuable — and which together add up to a position of true competitive advantage for the company.



SHOWING EXCELLENCE IN EXECUTION

 

In the final analysis, it is results that count; the best vision, strategy and operating plans are useless if they are not diligently executed.  Fulfilling the role of follow-through in a structured, thorough way involves five steps: setting milestones for key operating plan deliverables; measuring results against those milestones; analyzing any results that fall short of the milestones; prescribing corrective actions; and updating the operating plan.  One of the key benefits of a structured and thorough follow-through approach is that it serves as an early warning system for your company which will dramatically increase the odds for effective execution.

CREATING THE BUY-IN AND PARTICIPATION

The fundamental role of communication is to reinforce and solidify all that you have done in your first five roles as CEO.  The quality with which you communicate throughout your company is a great multiplier – it will either complete the circle of your vision, strategy, team, operating plan and follow-through, enabling them to be realized as planned, or it will greatly marginalize your work on those other five roles. Communication ensures that everyone understands the company’s direction and their role in making it a reality.  Communication also serves to motivate employees, getting their buy-in and reinforcing it on a continuous basis.  And as critical as all the others, communication provides the opportunity to get feedback from those closest to the realities of your company, so that adjustments can be made as needed.

 

With best wishes

Dr Wilfred Monteiro