Do You Lead a Company, or Do You Just Have a Job?
Without appropriate systems, processes and people in place, many CEOs end up doing the work that should be done by others. They’ve successfully built a thriving enterprise, but either from a lack of knowing how to do it or becoming so dizzy with the details, they never rise above the fray of details to work on their business, rather than in it.
Know Your Role in the Grand Scheme
In the conversations that take place among CEO members of our Catapult Groups, we often ask: Whose job are you doing today and why are you doing it? The objective is finding a way out of being mired in day-to-day operations so that the CEO’s time is spent working on strategy as well as finding and retaining great talent.
This second goal, by the way, is very difficult to achieve, but when it’s done right, can be very rewarding. When you have talented, experienced people in place, you’re a giant step closer to separating yourself from daily operations.
Easily Staying Updated
Another tool for rising above the fray is being able to understand where your business is at a glance. A best practice among our Catapult Groups is developing a dashboard format for looking at key financial conditions. What’s our cash position? What’s our borrowing position? How much is owed to our business and is any of it substantially late?
As CEO, you should be able to access this kind of timely information from wherever you are, in or out of the office, while you’re traveling for business or on vacation. This data should be managed by others but always available to you.
Moving Forward
Armed with a dashboard format that really works, the business leader can detect anomalies as they occur. Rather than getting tied up looking at everything in the business, the leader can quickly determine if an issue needs to be addressed and take care of it. Then he or she can return to what a CEO really needs to do—strategizing for the future and being a great spokesperson for the company.
CEO members of Catapult Groups leverage the experience of their peer group sessions to focus on strategic issues and opportunities that take their business to the next level of success.
