Executive4sight

Resistance to change – really?

I was reading a post at LeadershipNow entitled Getting the Information You Need. It referred to an article written by Mark Ronald and Robert Shaw from the Leader to Leader institute entitled Developing Peripheral Vision.

They warn to watch for signs of resistance to change:

Silence: In leadership teams, members who don't support the trend of a decision often simply disengage from the dialogue and remain silent rather than pose a contrary point of view—particularly if the leader appears to support the decision or the group is moving quickly to closure. Who has checked out? Non-answers: People can opt out [...]

Continue reading >> Resistance to change – really?

Personal Characteristics of a Great CEO

In a previous post I talked about what would make a Great CEO and concluded that a Great CEOs, those in the top 2% of the Bell Curve, would have had a broad experience. Well, there is more to it than just a broad experience. A Great CEO for me has some personal characteristics uncommon on many people. I know that, as a CEO, I was certainly conscious about improving these aspects of my personality. So here are the top characteristics I would consider an exceptional combination:

Stamina – Not age. Ideally your looking for someone in its 50's [...]

Continue reading >> Personal Characteristics of a Great CEO

Believe it or not

We all know the power of the brain. No one would argue that humans can achieve the seemingly impossible when they apply their collective brain to a problem. Since the beginning of human kind, countless proofs of the power of the human "belief engine" can be found in everything that surrounds us, from harnessing the power of fire, to the invention of the wheel, to landing a spaceship on a moving planet traveling at 87,000 km/h, 36 millions miles away.

Beliefs shape how we act in our everyday life. Albert Einstein had beliefs, despite his Cartesian approach to science, [...]

Continue reading >> Believe it or not

Nothing else Matters until the Big Picture is Clear!

When all you are allowed to see are the two beige pixels, it is hard for anyone to get a good perspective of the task at hand.

Are these two beige pixels part of a bigger picture, the sole of a shoe perhaps? Even knowing that this is the sole of a shoe is not all that enlightening. The second picture gives more details: the shoe belongs to a child sitting on the ground scribbling on a piece of cardboard. That still, you guest it, does not give the full picture – because you've seen there is a more [...]

Continue reading >> Nothing else Matters until the Big Picture is Clear!

Why aren’t the dogs eating the dog food?

Many organizations throw sales people out on the street in the hope they will make their companies successful. Although sales success is not possible without great sales people, a lot more than hiring great sales people is required to achieve sales success.

Sales leadership starts in the office of the CEO. The office of the CEO must induce a culture of strategic selling to the whole organization. Selling strategically means implementing a Sales Governance Model and developing competencies at 3 levels: Sales Governance, Sales-Cycle Management and Sales Execution.

As you look at the list of competencies an organization [...]

Continue reading >> Why aren’t the dogs eating the dog food?