Category Archives: CEO Shoptalk

01/4/22

CEO Shoptalk – Talent Spotting, the Louisiana Maneuvers of September 1941

A good CEO is always hiring and a great CEO is always looking for talent — talent spotting.

General George C Marshall was hailed by none other than Winston Churchill as the “Architect of Victory” for the manner in which he planned and executed the decisive American involvement in the war.

The most important element of his work may have been his ability to spot and develop talent within the American general officer corps.

But, what exactly did Marshall do that was so significant as to earn that title? Continue reading →

12/30/21

CEO Shoptalk — What Do You Tolerate?

In the CEOing business, we spend a lot of time discussing culture, as we should.

Culture is spawned by the founder’s values which many times are a work in progress, particularly for first time CEO/founders. Perfectly natural.

In mature startups — still growing, but growing at scale meaning they are out of the cradle and “walking” swiftly in the crawl, walk, run continuum — this becomes incredibly important as the CEO cannot have a finger in every pie and the best CEOs are excellent delegators which mandates giving up a modicum of control.

It is at this instant in time that the company, its workforce, begins to own the culture and grow it though they never abandon the founder’s values. Continue reading →

12/11/21

CEO Shoptalk – The Mantle Of Power

The best job I’ve ever had was as the company commander of a combat engineer company in the Army. It is like being a Chinese feudal war lord which is reputed to be a very good gig.

Company D as in Delta was in need of a firm hand having failed to pass its annual ARTEP (Army Training and Evaluation Program) for multiple years. The battalion was headquartered about five hundred miles away and I never met my battalion commander. Not sure I knew his name.

I was quite alone. Continue reading →

12/5/21

CEO Shoptalk — Germinating Ideas

Suppose you are a CEO/founder of a company that has MVP (minimum viable product) in the rear view mirror and are scaling — “Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead!”

You will from time to time encounter a “good idea” either of your own origin or a bit of “monkey see, monkey do” which is a vastly underrated idea source.

How do you approach it? You let the idea germinate. [You can stop reading right now. Good day.] Continue reading →

12/3/21

When The Student Is Ready . . . . .

I get a lot of emails from readers of this blog. I answer all of them. Often when someone asks me a question, I just call them under the theory of, “If it can be dispensed with within two minutes or less, do it now.”

A substantial number of emails are about The Wisdom of the Campfire which is the CEO coaching business I have run for a decade. It does not have a website; I do not market it; I only take referrals, but you can refer yourself if you have that gear.

A common suggestion is that I write more about CEO coaching. This is balanced by a number of other suggestions that suggest I write more/less about politics — nah, but thanks. I try to only write about policy.

There is a writer who demands I write fanciful Army stories. One writer has asked me on a few occasions to thin the herd by dropping out in a very final and forceful sort of way.

CEO coaching is an interesting endeavor. It is based upon a single foundation — is the CEO ready to be coached?

I often say, “When the student is ready, the teacher will appear.”

Board meeting in progress – which one is the CEO/founder? Note the gender diversity, lively engaged debate, and relaxed business casual dress code. 

Continue reading →

11/4/21

CEO Shoptalk – Signal V Noise In A Hurry

The only real equality in the world is time. We each get 24 hours a day. The rest of equality notions are lies, headfakes, just opiates for the masses — except for time.

Time is an absolute and nobody gets one more minute in an hour than all of us do. When it comes to time, you are as rich as Elon Musk.

Which beings me to the subject of how we use our time and the friction that life imposes on us and thereby shoplifts our time. Continue reading →

10/24/21

CEO Shoptalk — Persuasion

If you are a CEO, a manager, a leader you will of necessity order persons who are your subordinates to do things that need to be done. It is the nature of a senior-subordinate relationship, an employer-employee relationship. It is an every day action in the workplace.

How can you ensure that these things you require to be done are, in fact, done?

There are essentially three ways:

 1. You can mandate that they be done under pain of punishment. Discipline in the work place is always lurking just below the surface.

Taken to an extreme, if you fail to follow the mandate, you will be fired.

In 33 years as a CEO and 5 years an Army officer, I never had anyone defy my orders or found it necessary to discipline anybody for willfully not following my direction.

I had plenty of times when someone did not do something I had ordered to be done well, but that is not what we are talking of today.

 2. You can reward persons for the accomplishment of the task.

Whatever behaviors you reward will be observed by others and duplicated.

Feed the good angels; starve the bad angels. Get more good angels. Money talks.

 3. You can persuade them of the necessity and wisdom that the thing be done.

Persuasion requires education, communication, salesmanship, a bit of cajolery, and the willingness to engage in calm debate wherein the titular power of the CEO is put aside for a second as he/she deploys the power of logic. Continue reading →

10/12/21

CEO Shoptalk — Not Cleared In Hot

When you are calling in CAS (close air support — might be Snakes, Warthogs, fast movers, Puff the Magic Dragon — I know, dating myself) you will tell the flyboys they are “cleared hot” meaning they can bring their special brand of firepower and turn it loose on the target and that the friendlies are out of the line of fire. You are also assuring them that if you had guns firing that the gun-target line is clear.

When you are a CEO, you can never, ever clear yourself in hot when disciplining employees. Continue reading →