YOUR FOCUS IS THE COMPANY FOCUS

Do you realize when you have lost your focus about the primary essentials of running a money making company?

1. Do you see decisions made by your direct reports that you feel are not prudent?

2. Do you know exactly where your company needs to put its attention?

3. Can you give a fifteen second statement about the focus of your company to a new Board Member?

4. Do you teach the business fundamentals to your management group on an annual basis and apply them to your present business environment?

5. Do you have excitement about applying business savvy to your company no matter what the circumstances?

6. Do you assume everyone knows what you do?  Or do you assume most people can't understand the complexity of your company?

7. Is the 'what' of your company balanced with the 'how'?

You may have a blindspot about the most basic elements of money making and have gotten lost in the forest of daily distractions. Maintaining the 'right' focus for your company is at the top of the CEO list of to do's.

Try asking random people in your management group:
—What were our sales last year?
—Are sales growing or declining? 
—Profit margin? In comparison with other companies in your industry? 
—Here's a good one. Ask about inventory velocity or asset velocity?
—ROA?
—Cash? Increase or decrease? Why? 
—How do we stand in relationship to the competition?

The C-Suite members should know this without a moment's hesitation. But how literate is your company as a whole? These basics are what makes a strategy make sense rather than being a slogan or list of rules. 

Thanks to Ram Charon (What the CEO Wants You to Know) and Daniel Goleman (Focus) for their writing on this topic.

ARE YOU STUCK IN 'SKIMMING' MODE?

1. Do you go beyond the executive summary on an important topic?

2. When you insist on 'exception reporting', do you note it but don't dig for the cause for the exception?

3. Do you worry more about time than content during meetings?

4.. Are you so quickly touching bases that you miss important emerging information you might need?

5. Do you get only fleeting glances of possibly serious relationship issues in your team?

6. Would your assessment of the functioning of your business be the same as randomly selected people in your organization?

7. Do you, yourself, miss the grit of an average business day? 

8. Do you know the major challenge of each of your functional leaders?

9. Do you spend more time traveling and dining with leaders than you do understanding
their business challenges and generating options to meet the challenges?

I remember the blur of meetings and crowded calendars and the ever present issue of 
limited time and huge scope of being a top executive. That dynamic can create a sense of
waste, hyper-active work and low impact. Not what you want as a top executive.
I have seen a burned out CEO get re-energized by going to a store and working with associates and seeing actual customers. (I worked in food retailing and banking)
It brings the conceptual, strategic work down to earth. It reminds leaders that they are not playing chess at the top. I also suggest digging deep yourself, not through Human Resources or your direct report, when you sense something is off. This is the moment to dig deep to get your own tangible knowledge. Of course, you tell the functional leader that you are going to
touch thing up close or you do it with your EC colleague. What you learn will give you insight into the company as a whole, allow you to make better decisions and to course correct.
The people in your company will respect, even admire your care and diligence. It's hard to stop the scanning/skimming approach and you can't afford to dig deep often. But it is essential to know when to do it and the impact on you and your company will be big.

CURIOUS ABOUT HOW DECISIONS ARE MADE

I have worked in many countries and have been there durng Easter time.
Each celebrates Easter differently. 
I am in Maine for Easter this year. I came home from Mexico for a week for family birthdays, business and Easter too.
I was surprised to see two major supermarkets closed for Easter Sunday.
Everything would be closed in Mexico, so why was I surprised?
Not sure.
I guess I view the US as primarily secular.
Or pragamatic.
Or so pluralistic that we wouldn't close the doors to non Easter celebrating people.
I got curious about the decision.
Was it sales numbers for Easter Sunday in the past?
Was it to be good to employees?
Was it to please customers?
Who made the decision?
Has the store always been closed on Easter Sunday?
What were the factors involved in the decision.
What was discussed?
Was it an easy, automatic decision or complex and heated?

How does a CEO or top executive not become blind to how decisions are made or more importantly, the impact of the decision.  I'm curious.

STRENGTHENING YOUR EARLY ADAPT MUSCLE

 The demand for large company innovation is here again. It does come and go as with different  two pressures--a tightening market and economy or optimism combined with need for the new to compete. I used to do lots of keynote speaking and training on innovation and the creative  process.

It is actually highly skill based but needs the ooomph and discipline to support develop it in large organizations.

Here are some of facts about early adapter CEO's as researched by

business+strategy and written up by David Clarke.

—They embrace novelty and take pride in being ahead of the game

—They're willing to be guinea pigs

—They are taste makers

—They lose interest quickly

—They are fundamentally optimistic about the future

The rationale for the need to become an early adapter CEO is, as Clarke says, that the price that early adopters were willing to pay was a multiple of what the product would cost once it hit critical market adoption.

I like this kind of talk. It energizes me. And I hesitate. I've worked with CEO's obsessed with innovation and I've worked with the determinedly prudent CEO. I wonder if the CEO is the early adapter or is it  the mavericks or company culture who push innovation. I see the CEO managing the pace and strategic content of innovation and demanding new ideas from the company--whole company. A balancing, choke is needed.

Then again, Virgin Galactic has already taken $250,000 as deposits from 700  people for trips to space. Check your reaction to that statement. It may reveal your blind spot about your early 
adapter muscle. Do you immediately get interested or do you immediately dismiss it as too bleeding edge? I would certainly have Boards assess their CEO's (you) on this dimension.

IN DEFENSE OF PENCE????

I'm kind of, sort of, maybe writing in defense of Vice-President Pence's stance about never meeting or dining out with a woman alone, other than his wife.

There are all kind of things to say about that stance and they are being said.
—non-thinking stupid evangelical. Heck, Christ did it all the time and with all kinds of women
—overly sexed man who is so easily led into temptation
—big ego guy thinking all women are unable to resist him
—marginalizes women who will get ignored by him for important positions
—makes women a sex object to be avoided

These are a few  of the things being said. And, at first, I said, "Right on. He is a prissy throw back to the 50's. He's not a modern man. He can't understand the Pussy Brigade.
(I gag on the word. I'm over 50 by quite a bit)

Then I paused to think about my experience in the world and in large organizations.
Here is what my experience says:

Being in power puts you in a very vulnerable position. Man or woman, people will want alone time to influence you. It is a very natural instinct. By the way, women are way better at it having been one down for a long time. We learn. The under dog kisses up.

I've seen quite a few relationships start with wine and fun and alone time, that end up sliding into something more that ends up hurting work and family and careers. Certainly may have happened anyway, but better outside the realm of work.

Leaders are human. They need and want comfort. They want reassurance that they are doing a good job. Men don't do that so well with one another. Women have been trained to it.
And it does happen the other way around, with women in the top role and men supporting and comforting. I, personally have not seen it become sexual with women leaders.

Sex is. 

Knowing personal from professional and minding that boundary does matter. Pence is just a little rigid about it. But not a fool. Not a fool.