Start-up CEO vs. Expansion CEO

Most company founders embark on a start-up journey with aspirations to see the company through to greatness while maintaining the role of the CEO.  However, the role of startup CEO and expansion-stage CEO differ greatly.  They require completely different skill sets, and it’s extremely rare for a founder to have both start-up and growth-stage skills.  A majority of founders end up recruiting replacements to take over the companies they created.  There is absolutely nothing wrong with that. It is a common reality that accompanies the shift from searching for a business model to executing and scaling it effectively.

A founding CEO must be tactical, hands-on, gets stuff done, where a professional manager CEO focuses on the vision/strategy, building a senior team, and guiding the senior team to execution.

Navigating a company through the expansion stage takes operational expertise. You have to know how to recruit senior managers who have specific functional expertise, and you must be able to establish an operating rhythm that gets your growing team working toward the right goals. As your company transitions to the next stage, you must transition with it, and as you do you are faced with three paths.

1) Adapt to the New Reality

If you are dead set on remaining CEO, then you need to pick up the new skills needed to address the blind spots and manage your company’s expansion. That means you have to augment those skills that got you where you are now: your audacity to do something new, your passion to inspire others to take risks, and the tenacity to create and disrupt markets. In addition, you need to focus on managing through others (this one can be the biggest challenge) and developing a rhythm for your team.

It’s extremely rare for a founder to have both start-up and growth-stage skills, and it’s even less likely that you can pick them up as you go. So, consider whether you’d hire yourself to run your company now that you are expanding — chances are, the honest answer is no.

2) Assemble a Skilled Team

Another option is to surround yourself with an executive team that brings the growth-stage experience and expertise your company needs.  For most companies entering the expansion stage, a sales and marketing-focused COO is the right choice.  However, if you need more cover on overall operations, financial forecasting, and legal matters, then a CFO makes sense.

When it comes down to it, companies aren’t run by highly effective individuals; they’re run by highly effective teams. Most successful CEO’s will tell you to surround yourself with the best people possible who are experts in the areas you are weak in.  This will allow you to focus on your strengths.

3) Transition into a New Role

The majority of start-up CEOs recruit their replacements as the company grows beyond $15 million in revenue. It’s that simple, and it’s usually the right choice. Work with your board to bring on a new CEO and transition into a new role. Don’t let your ego drive an emotional reaction. Put the company first, just as you always have, and you will come to the conclusion that it’s the right decision.

After Corporate Changes; are you still a fit?

Whenever some kind of organizational change happens, both employers and employees can experience an unexpected “crisis of confidence.” Whether the change is a merger, upgraded software system, marketplace positioning, new CEO—here’s what emerges:

• Suddenly and mysteriously, people don’t feel quite as talented and capable as before.

• At the same time, the organization is wondering where its talented people went.

The real fact: no one suddenly got stupid!

Second fact: Something else will now need to change.

You or Them?

When you were hired it was a good fit because of how business was conducted. Now it doesn’t seem that way. Here are some considerations when companies and employees find themselves in a talent mismatch as a result of changes:

1. Companies: Take time to re-assess the breadth of talent that exists in your employee base. You may not have been using the range of talents that individuals possess because you (naturally) hired them against a given set of criteria.

Real-life example: In the past few years I’ve had the opportunity to assess three executives who were on the, “We’ve changed, their role isn’t needed anymore, I guess they have to go even though they’ve been really effective” list. In two of the three cases a broader assessment showed that they were gifted in areas that hadn’t been tapped into before. Those two remain with their organizations in new roles and are contributing meaningfully and productively.

2. Individuals. Maybe it isn’t such a good fit. The faster you figure out the reality of the situation the faster you can make a decision to stay or look elsewhere.

Important Tip: The longer you hang out in a mismatch the more you will question your adequacy. So, knock it off! You are talented and you’ve been performing in a talented way. The situation changed, not you. Get yourself into another winning situation before you conclude that the problem is you.

The basics of good leadership

Throughout my career I have had the opportunity to work with numerous senior leaders.  In trying to understand where I may be able to help them I typically ask “What are the three or four biggest challenges you’re facing in your business right now?” Even with an incredibly diverse sample of businesses, it has been interesting to see a clear pattern emerge of four specific issues that the vast majority of these leaders identify as the things that are holding their organizations back and keep them up at night.

1. Lack of a vivid and extremely well-communicated vision

Even though these leaders are passionate about the vision and direction of their company, they reluctantly admit that if you were to go just one or two levels below them in the organization, you would likely find very few, if any, employees that truly understand the vision, mission and core values of their organization. A major job of every leader, whether you lead two people or 20,000, is to relentlessly communicate an exciting and clear vision for the future of the organization. In one-on-one meetings, town halls, e-mails, voice mails, team meetings …  the goal is to help people clearly see where the business is headed and what they need to focus on to make sure you all arrive there together successfully.

2. Lack of open, honest and courageous communication

The inability or unwillingness to put difficult, uncomfortable and awkward topics on the table for candid and transparent discussion was identified by these leaders as a major inhibitor to their ability to build strong teams and get their organizations fully aligned. As Patrick Lencioni points out in his superb book “The Five Dysfunctions of a Team,” in large part this lack of openness stems from a fundamental absence of trust that leads to unwillingness by people on the team to be vulnerable and completely honest. However, the desperate need for courageous communication and high levels of transparency is powerfully demonstrated in Jim Kouzes and Barry Posner’s seminal book “The Leadership Challenge,” which undeniably shows that honesty is the single most important driver in establishing credibility as a leader. Especially in times of great turmoil like we are facing now, employees crave as much information as they can get about how things are going in the company and what they need to do to keep it moving forward. Where there is a lack of a well-communicated vision mission and values, you quickly see fear, politics, rumor-mongering rushing in to fill the void.

3. Lack of accountability

As a direct result of the lack of honesty and courageous communication mentioned above, one of the difficult conversations not occurring is a frank discussion about tolerating mediocre performance. After taking a good, hard look at their business, many of the leaders I work with realize that they have a few mediocre performers in key positions in their organization and that every day they leave them there is another day they are in effect saying to the rest of the company, we were just kidding about pursuing excellence.  The truth is it is not right to let a small few jeopardize the organization and destroy their own career because their leader did not have the courage to tell them the truth about their poor performance. Here is a test will bring this into sharp focus:  Think of a person in your organization that consistently delivers sub par work, turn things in late and has a poor attitude. … Now realize that, because they still have their job, this individual is the person who establishes the level of acceptable work for every other employee in your company. How does that make you feel?

4. Lack of disciplined execution

What percentage of the time do you think companies that have a solid plan for how to succeed in the marketplace … actually effectively execute to plan? The answer has remained the same year after year: 10 to 15%. That number is shockingly low.  What is even more devastating is to realize the monumental waste of talent, resources, opportunity and money that low number represents. However, the process for ensuring effective execution is really straightforward and simple. Just a handful of key steps need to be applied with vigor and total accountability. Leaders just have to be willing and able develop a culture of disciplined execution by establishing the systems, processes and checkpoints to ensure consistent flawless execution of all critical initiatives

At the end of the day, none of the things listed here are particularly new or revolutionary. Actually, I am sure that most of us will recognize them as well-established fundamentals for leading a world-class organization. However there is a huge difference between knowing something … and living it every day in your organization.

The Concept of Effective Leadership

The concept of effective leadership has changed over the years. The old-style concept of a leader being the directing chief at the top of a hierarchy is incomplete at best, harmful to the organization or company at worst. In today’s world, this view simply does not truly appreciate the very nature of true leadership.

Leadership is also misunderstood to mean directing and instructing people and making important decisions on behalf of an organization. Yes, leaders make decisions. Yes, leaders instruct and teach. However, effective leadership involves much more than these.

The very nature of effective leadership is seen in an understanding of the difference between “management” and “leadership.” They are often mistaken as one and the same, which they are not.

There are distinguishing differences:

• Management is concerned with processes / Leadership is      concerned with behavior.
• Management relies on measurable capabilities like systems, goals, planning and evaluation.
• Leadership, while involving many management skills, relies on less tangible and measurable things like trust, inspiration, motivation and personal character.

While a bit simplified, we can boil down the main difference between management and leadership to be: Leadership is about leading people and influencing behavior. Management is about managing processes and securing results.

With this difference in mind, let’s look at five tips for effective leadership:

1. Become a servant. Effective leadership involves serving. Too many leaders go about this backwards. They see the role of their people as servants to them as the leader. Good leaders see themselves as a servant of the organization and the people within it.  Ineffective leadership takes. It sets itself up to garner favor or personal gain. Servant leadership is an opportunity to give and to give in such a way that fosters growth in people.

2. Understand that leadership is about people. While leadership does involve making decisions and taking action, it is centrally concerned with people and behavior.

Strong leaders are able to see and understand vital relationships even within large and complex networks of people. These leaders then focus on building those vital relationships in such a way that adds to the trust level between them and these networks. People follow leaders they trust. They also are drawn to leaders who possess positive qualities like:

Integrity, honesty, humility, courage, commitment, sincerity, confidence, positivity, compassion; just to name a few.

When it all comes down to it, effective leaders can express their humanity in such a way that fosters trust and builds commitment from those they seek to lead.

3. Be an engaging conversationalist. Smart leaders spend their time starting and advancing conversations within their organization, not running away and hiding from them.

It is nearly impossible to engender the necessary confidence, trust and loyalty a leader must possess without being fully engaged.  A leader spends as much time out of the confines of the office engaging in real conversation with people as they do in their office planning, decision-making and organizing. Whether in person, over the phone, via email, through the social web, or even by sending a good old fashion “thank you” note – be an engaging conversationalist.

4. Listen. This tip piggy backs off of the former one. As you are an engaging conversationalist, listen.  Great leaders realize that there is far more to be gained by surrendering control of the conversation than by dominating it. Being a leader doesn’t give license for you to talk just to hear your head rattle. Powerfully effective leaders realize the value of what can be gleaned from the minds of others. Know when it is time to stop talking and start listening. People want to be heard. They need their voice to be affirmed.

5. Lead yourself. It’s important that leaders have the ability to focus and motivate themselves as they motivate others. In fact, without this ability securely fastened in your own life, you cannot be a truly effective leader of others. I believe we really do lead by example.  It is vitally important that we have a handle on the leadership of ourselves so that we have a positive, strong and trustworthy example for those we lead. Leaders know that while some people can be considered “natural born leaders,” most have to learn the art. Therefore, effective leaders seek opportunities for personal growth. They seek out books to read, seminars they can attend or personal coaches to foster their growth.  Leaders never stop learning for their benefit and the benefit of those they serve. Leadership is an exciting thing. It can be the most joyous and personally fulfilling work you do. It is my hope that you find these tips helpful along your journey.

Workplace Satisfaction Article by Ana McGary

http://www.healthcareitnews.com/best-hospitals-content/universal-laws-workplace-satisfaction

Mutual Agreement

Negotiation is a fact of life. Everyone negotiates something every day. At work we negotiate about schedules, budgets, task allocation, you name it.

One thing is clear: certain people will shy away from negotiating because they fear the confrontation.  One way to minimize the whole confrontation thing is to establish a tone for a mutually worthwhile conversation

Think about using questions like:

1. “What would you like to see as one of the outcomes today?”
2. “What else can I tell you about my situation?”
3. “What else can you tell me about your ideas so that I can better understand your perspective?”
4. “What do you need from me that would be helpful?”

You get the idea.

You’ll know you’ve reached the most cooperative agreement when everyone at the table says, “This is the best decision possible given all the facts we have.” Emotionally, no one will feel worse off than before, and may have even greater respect for each than before.

The biggest possible payoff: A result that offers bigger benefits than anyone originally thought possible.

Any method of negotiation should be judged by three criteria:
Should produce wise agreement if agreement is possible;
Should be efficient;
Should improve or at least not damage the relationship between the parties.

Creating a Sustainable Competitive Advantage

To survive and prosper, small and midsize companies must establish a marketing presence based upon a sustainable competitive advantage.

I often speak with company owners and CEO’s that want to grow their organizations, but don’t know how to take the next step.  It’s difficult when you’ve worked so hard to build your current business to slow down enough to look what’s next.

So where do you start?

Examine your Marketing Presence.  This is the message your organization communicates to its prospect and customer base.  Is your message effective?  To be effective, the message should be clear and simple — and contain the key attributes you want associated with your business.

What is your Competitive advantage?  The sum of those attributes that differentiate your business from its competitors. This is your core competence. You develop, build and enhance it through a clear understanding of your customers’ wants and needs. You implement it through a strategic plan (a directional compass) that can help you quickly adapt to changes in their wants and needs.

Is it Sustainable? Can it keep in existence, maintain and affirm the validity of, support the spirit, vitality and resolution of, encourage, endure and withstand. Only through your continuous understanding of what makes your business competitive can your business survive and prosper. GE’s former CEO, Jack Welch, once said, “If you don’t have a competitive advantage, don’t compete.”

Since it takes two — a buyer and a seller — to make a sale, the reason for establishing a viable marketing presence is for your business to be on the prospective buyer’s “short list” when the buyer is ready to buy. You want to be sure that your company is among those being evaluated when the prospect’s need arises.

When you think about your competitive advantage, consider that in your prospect’s mind your company “fits” into some category.  For example, you are either a “low-cost” or “value-added” supplier. A low-cost supplier is categorized as one who consistently provides a lower cost with acceptable quality. A value-added supplier provides a differentiated product or service that contains substantial attributes which command a premium price.

Likewise, you are either a “generalist” or a “specialist”. A generalist is categorized as having a broad scope — serving all types of customers in an industry or geographical area, offering a broad range of products or services.  A specialist focuses on specific products or services and dedicates all efforts to that one niche or market segment.

The key element in your thinking should be to make a difference. You must take the risk to create a recognizable choice from your rival companies.  Your worst error here would be to imitate rival companies or being all things to all people.

As you think strategically about establishing or re-establishing your market presence, consider this process:

Conceptualize your strategy — this is pure and analytical. Engineer general agreement to the strategy — here you are muddling over the practicality of what you want to do and sharing your ideas with others and getting their input.  You might also seek the help of a business coach during this period.

Prepare a mission statement and business plan — to discover and clarify what business you are in and how you plan to approach it.

Communicate the statement and plan — both internally and externally.

Live the plan — if all the steps feel right, start to implement the plan — but with the full expectation, knowledge and intent (this is really important) you will continuously adjust and adapt it to market changes.

Composure – A key leadership skill

In my opinion composure and self-control are very necessary leadership attributes. I will take it a step further to say that without it, one can only go so far in a professional business environment.  For some, composure is effortless, seems like it comes as second nature to them. For others, it must be cultivated — and not easily. As I coach leaders, I urge them to explore different techniques or methods to help them control their emotions, especially when the going gets tough.

A good example is a Fire Battalion Chief on the scene of a major fire. Amid the smoke and fire and heat, they typically radiate sheer calmness. Emotions might be roiling inside, but outwardly they are cool as a cucumber.

Their coolness leads to something I call the clarity to see complexity. By not succumbing to the mayhem of chaos, they keep their heads clear to think through the possibilities. In this instant if the Battalion Chief gives into emotions, lives are at a greater risk.

Your situation may not risk lives but letting your emotions get the best of you, limits your ability to focus on the options.

Some techniques that may help:

• Breathe deeply.      In the heat of the moment, there is a tendency to breathe rapidly. So take  a deep breath. Feel the breath come into your lungs. Exhale, than repeat      a few times. It slows things down, really!

• Relax your facial muscles. Tension is evident on our faces. So be conscious of how      you look. Rub your cheeks and flex them. Smile if appropriate, as a means      of reassuring others.

• Keep your voice lower. When tension rises, people speak more quickly and with      more emotion. A leader’s job is to keep calm. So speak slowly and at a      lower pitch. Others will notice and maybe follow suit.

Remaining composed under pressure is not the answer to all leadership challenges, but for my money, I would rather follow an executive who keeps it together than one who is wild-eyed and restlessly pacing.

Accept Failures to Succeed!

Some people never fail. They’re the ones with no aspirations, no will to excel, no guts. Everyone likely to be reading this, however, has failed. Repeatedly, I might add.

What we all have in common is the temptation to simply put it behind us and forget it ever happened. To spit failure out and get that bitter taste out of our mouths before it does any real damage to our self-confidence. As soon as possible, if not sooner.

But the strong and successful among us resist that urge because we know better. Painful as it is, we carry our failures around with us every day of our lives. Not as a badge of honor, although it’s tempting to feel that way. We do it for two reasons. First, failure is how we learn. Failure teaches us how to do things differently. How to do things better.

Failing to admit and learn from failure will only lead to more dramatic failure. The converse is also true: admitting and learning from failure will ultimately lead to success. Unfortunately, leaders seem to be allergic to the whole idea of admitting failure.

But there’s actually an even more important lesson that failure teaches us. A more important reason to never forget that we’ve failed and will fail again. It reminds us that we’re human. On the surface, that sounds almost too simple to be important. But that’s a characteristic of most important lessons.

Being aware of your failures gives you a unique sense of empathy, humility, even humor, that others don’t possess. It means approaching your job, each and every day, with a level of genuine openness to the ideas and positions of others, not in spite of the fact that they differ from yours, but because they do, because you know you might be wrong and they might be right.

It’s tempting to think of this as a lesson for the young, but it’s not. It’s a lesson for all ages.  Take Steve Jobs, for example. It’s easy to forget that he wasn’t always a leadership icon. While Apple did invent a truly breakthrough computer, the company’s first decade was turbulent and Jobs’ management style was so toxic that he was essentially forced out of the company. That was painful for Jobs. And his next venture, NeXT, lost a boatload of investment capital.  So, when Apple’s acquisition of NeXT returned Jobs to the company he cofounded, he was a very different man. He was a far more mature and balanced individual than the one who was drummed out of the company 11 years before. Clearly, success and failure both contributed to that transformation.

This is just one example, but every successful leader will point to failure as a key ingredient in their growth, maturity, and success. People often confuse having courage with being fearless. Actually, nobody is fearless. Courage, on the other hand, means facing your fear and doing the right thing anyway. Sometimes you win; sometimes you lose. And once you’ve been through that a few times, it makes you a better and more successful person. But only as long as you never forget.

 

Leaders may need “timeout”

Too many companies are plagued by “sandbox leadership,” with executives behaving more like spoiled toddlers than responsible adults.  We’ve seen this attitude reflected in the halls of government and corporate boardrooms across the country.  Arrogance, pouting, tantrums, personal attacks, and betrayal of trust seem to be the order of the day.  The nation’s current problems, as vast and overwhelming as they are, appear secondary to the whims of spoiled children, unwilling to play well together. At a time when we need solid, grounded leadership more than ever, we seem to be in short supply of adults who act like, well…like adults. What makes this even worse is that employees at all levels mimic what they see in their leaders.

I realize this is not necessarily a new thing; it just seems to be more obvious lately. Sometimes in dealing with these less than “adult” individuals, I think
maybe I should work with children; at least I can put them in “timeout” and tell them to think about it for a while.  Decorum, self-control, compromise and honor are sorely lacking today. And to be fair, many leaders and employees alike— I would even say the majority — are honest, hard-working, dedicated individuals. But unfortunately the leadership that’s getting attention today in both the public and private sector is sending our potential leaders a very poor example.

To put it simply, we need more mature leaders — now.

Maturity is experience-driven perspective and awareness of your emotional patterns and triggers. It is the ability to suppress impulse and master emotional reactions. Many of our leaders today have other excellent leadership skills, but only a remarkable few are able to control their impulses and put others’ needs first.

The key is control. Every day, we are confronted with decisions that have short-and long-term implications. Mature adults can fend off short-term impulses by keeping the long-term in view; this is what helps them stay in control.  Similarly, the best leaders I have worked with are masters of their emotions. They rein them in when the situation demands it, or let loose when it will have maximum impact. At times, you need to be still and impenetrable; in other moments, you need to be able to pound your fist on the table. It is not whether you are typically a calm or intense person. It is your ability to gain mastery over your emotional tendencies and reactions. You must develop the ability to fit the emotion to the demands of the situation. Either way, you remain in control.

This isn’t easy, and executive maturity takes time to accrue — though we’ve seen it doesn’t always come with experience. Regardless, whether you are a current CEO or an aspiring one, there are ways to accelerate this ability intentionally.

Know your triggers. Leaders are sometimes consumed with so many day-to-day responsibilities that they rarely stop to reflect on how and what they react to. But understanding your own triggers and vulnerabilities is a must — you need to recognize the kinds of events that bring out the worst in you. Think about the times you’ve flown off the handle or lost control. What set you off? Think about the vices you have and the opportunities that would lead to indiscretion.  Be realistic. Then look for the subtle signals people give off in response to your behavior. If you don’t like what you see — you are at risk.

Assemble a “personal board of directors.” Everyone needs to vent. Find a person or group of people you can trust to share your feelings and experiences with honestly so that you don’t snap and get defensive under pressure — and publicly. If you can’t find these
people in your organization (and many leaders cannot), look elsewhere in your personal network for those who will both listen to your frustrations and give
you honest feedback about how you’re being perceived when you show your emotions.

Define your personal code. Maturity is expressed through your judgment — what you decide and how you react. One of the best things you can do to enhance your judgment is to define your personal code, or your fundamental beliefs about work and life. Take a moment to write down five things you believe in as a leader. Share your list with the people who report to you. Think about how powerful it would be for your people to understand what you believe in at your core, and what behavior is acceptable under your leadership.  Leaders who put their own gratification above the needs of others lack the ability to see the long-term consequences of their actions. This does not bode well for them, the economy, or our country. It’s time we start counting emotional maturity and control among the “must-haves” for leaders everywhere.