www.1001TopWords.com |
CEOs Are Great, Top CEOs Are Greater
People in leading positions are often in a dilemma: on one hand they are supposed to give great performances, make the right decisions and so forth; on the other hand, they have to fill the role of a very confident and self-assured manager. This may be considered a dilemma because CEOs are expected to be almost supernatural, and asking for assistance in what is supposed to be their core competence (leadership!) simply does not fit the picture, no matter how necessary it may be. It is interesting to draw a parallel to sports. I don't know of any world-class athletes who do not have coaches or trainers to assist them in the development of their core competency (e.g., golf, tennis, etc.). It seems that in the area of sports, it is generally accepted that top performers need top assistance, i.e., coaches. Also, nobody in sports seems to feel the necessity to hide that they employ a coach. Meanwhile, many of the top CEOs (at least in the US) have coaches, but very few want to admit or even talk about it. CEOs are usually in a situation with a unique handicap: being on top of an organization, they must demonstrate powerful and wise leadership but may not be able to share their doubts with others in the organization, as this would not fit the expected image. A trusted and competent executive coach can take over this necessary function of a sparring partner. The coach can mirror the existing options and reveal blind spots, share his experiences, and challenge limiting beliefs of CEOs. Additionally, a trusted coach can help CEOs in dealing with ethical and personal issues that may influence performance. All in all, the coach can be the competent and equal (!) partner, which many CEOs need in their unique and exposed position. It seems there is still a long way to go before CEOs will be able to speak about their coaches as lightly and as naturally as top athletes do. A great first step is to recognize the benefits a coach provides to a CEO in his professional and personal life. Top CEOs know this already and benefit from coaching through better performance, a greater feeling of security and a more stable work-life balance. Again: top performers need top assistance, and professional coaches can be a crucial element of a strong support system. About Charlie Lang Charlie works with senior executives who are already successful and want to stay at the leading edge. They are often challenged by issues like: - How to improve staff retention, especially how to keep top performers Charlie, an executive coach & trainer who is known for his innovative approaches towards leadership, change processes and sales, assists his clients in mastering these challenges. They achieve outstanding results through Charlie's unique application of latest findings in research combined with his own experience in international management and leadership. Charlie is the author of numerous articles and of the book The Groupness Factor. He delivers speeches and keynotes on sales, leadership and coaching.
|
RELATED ARTICLES
Eight Skills of Highly Successful Consultants With deference to Dr. Covey and his very popular Seven Habits of Highly Effective People (all habits that will make us better consultants!), here are eight skills that all of us as consultants can work on to improve. This article will start with three overarching skills, then describe five more specific skills to consider in your ongoing development. Does My Bum Look Big in This? If a good manager asks his workforce for their opinion of him he will receive their expressions of approval and be satisfied that he is doing a good job. How to Set Up a Conference Call The methods in which you set up a conference call vary between the different services you use, and what type of conference calling you are using. There are three main types of conference calls, all with different methods of set up. Factoring Financing: How to Grow Your Business Without Debt or Loans What is factoring? Examining the Relationship Between Employee Satisfaction and Customer Satisfaction Researchers have undertaken numerous studies to look at the connection between customer and employee satisfaction. A majority of these studies were able to uncover a correlation between employee satisfaction, customer satisfaction and profitability. Getting to Consensus The need to get people in an organization to pull together comes out often in discussions about communication. Get Down With OCP: Evaluating DBA Job Applicants in an OCP World Not long ago, weeding through DBA applicants with a tech interview was a straightforward process. You'd ask candidates 200 or so technical questions. If they got 100 correct answers, you knew they'd been around the block; 150 or more and you knew you were on to superior talent. But once the Oracle Certification Program (OCP) became popular in the late 90s, the traditional tech interview lost its effectiveness. These days, candidates can answer 180 questions correctly and you still won't know whether they're talking from experience or simply regurgitating what they memorized at OCP a few weeks earlier. Although it has become increasingly difficult to determine whether you've found a seasoned, highly qualified DBA or a newly minted OCP Graduate, there are ways. Safety Policy Sample Outline Writing a safety manual is a tough job and most larger corporations outsource such jobs or they have someone on staff with the proper credentials in risk management. Imagine writing the safety manuals for NASA? I had the opportunity to be in the unique position of being able to imagine just such a thing when writing our company safety manuals. It takes lots of studying and review of case law to do it properly. Each industry is somewhat different and hopefully you know your industry and company well enough to give it a shot. Character: Is It Necessary In Leadership? (Part One) We know character when we see it, but what exactly is it? How do we define it? What role does it play in our getting results as leaders? What role does character play in our careers? Innovation Management ? some ideas are better than others Creativity can be defined as problem identification and idea generation whilst innovation can be defined as idea selection, development and commercialisation. What to Do When Trust is Low Trust is essential. You can't run a business without it. Customers leave. Risk taking evaporates. You find yourself surrounded by naysayers ? or worse ? yes men and women. No one dares tell the truth. Departments put up barricades creating fortresses inside your castle. Work Environment Tidbits 14 Ways to De-Stress Employee Vacations Employees truly deserve paid vacations. They Five Key Strategies for Making Your Nonprofit Business More Effective Consistently applying these strategies will help you achieve attention-getting results. Give it a try and track your progress. Five Strategies To Strengthen Your Company?s Financial Management Too many businesses wait until a crisis occurs before they start to focus on improving their financial management. Often, by that time, it can be too late. By setting aside an hour now to evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of your company's financial management activities and systems you can save a lot of time and aggravation. It can also help increase your profits, and at the end of the day that is what it is all about. How to Save Money on Training 1) Use a live instructor. Adults learn best by doing, practicing, and experiencing. Effective instructors customize their programs to meet people's needs, provide counsel on individual challenges, and respond to questions. Videos, CDs, and E-learning are seldom effective for primary learning. Since the greatest cost of learning is the payroll cost of the participants, you want to make sure the program delivers results. Quality Standards with ISO 9001 Standardizing Quality Systems Out of Control? There are papers on the floor, across the desk and resting on the keyboard. Piles of files are all around. Magazines, newspapers?you name it. Just about anything can be found in this office. You've seen it in your own organization. You know what I am talking about. Managing Client Relationships Managing Client Relationships: Even the best run organizations occasionally run into difficult situations with clients, consultants, and vendors. Often times it is not just a business process that has gone a-rye, it is the relationship of the people managing the situation. So how is it that we manage difficult problems and how is it that we coach all the members of our organization to manage crisis to their (and their company's) advantage. Here are some helpful tips: Five Ways to Influence Change in Others Because of my work as a consultant, trainer and coach I deal with change and people's reactions to it all the time. When a Client decides to work with us, they are recognizing that some sort of change is needed. After all, if they want more effective teams, better Customer Service, higher creativity, more effective training, or more effective leadership in their organizations, something has to become different than it is currently. Change must occur. |
© Athifea Distribution LLC - 2013 |