The Four Dilemmas of the CEO by Tom Biesinger

Author:Tom Biesinger
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing

4

The third dilemma

This chapter is about raising the bar of expectation and performance higher than you may currently believe possible. It is about shifting your executive from getting stuck in the business to working on the business in order to create sustainable breakthrough.

If you have mastered dilemma two, your executive will be reaching capacity for working in the business. You know you have the right players and there are no questions in your mind about your ExCo. These A players have mainly been focused on internal fires and fixes. They work well as a unit and have proven themselves individually and collectively. You have spent an inordinate amount of time and expended Herculean effort successfully moving through the second dilemma phase, transforming what you initially inherited into a machine that consistently delivers. The temptation is to continue to optimize efficiency gains and maintain a strong defensive team while making occasional forays into offense, quarterbacked by the MVP—you.

Things couldn’t be better. You have time to think, plan, and imagine what else might be possible. Deep inside, you know there is far more to play for, but your executive is at capacity working in the business.

Do you add more horsepower by bringing in new offensive players? Do you use externals surgically, with deep strategic expertise? Do you create a new inner circle with more strategy-minded people? How do you satisfy the urge to push for much more without alienating the good defensive players? And most importantly, with whom do you spar?

You have arrived at Dilemma Three: How do you engage the full capability of your executive on the business when their reputations were earned working in the business?

Experience has taught you that when a person begins to outgrow his role, he is at risk. This becomes your reality as soon as you have a talented ExCo in place and they, in turn, have their talented reports. The real insight into this dilemma can be found in the word capability. Though your ExCo is at maximum capacity for working in the business, it is not at maximum capability. There exists a deep well of opportunity and growth when you switch your ExCo from defense to offense, from working at capacity in the business to working at capability on the business.

Now is the time to shift your ExCo’s efforts from primarily working in the business to predominantly working on the business. This is no simple feat, as your ExCo have built their reputations by working mostly in the business, but it is absolutely necessary at this point in your life cycle—and it can be hugely rewarding for you and them.

The irony here is that you have little choice without churn. If the members of your ExCo are the A players we have described and you don’t create a hothouse within which they can flourish, you will lose them—probably to the competition. You can be sure they will push for more: more opportunity, more responsibility, and more reward. If you simply carry on with business

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