A successful CEO and his Organization

A successful CEO builds an organization to meet his goals.

POLC: plan–organize–lead–control.

Your plan is set, you now want to place your valuable talent in a structure whereby their skills move the firm forward.

Two people in your firm must report to you directly regardless of what type of business you are in… the CFO and the General Counsel. These two people are there to protect you from the two most frequent challenges you and you firm will face… financial hiccups and lawsuits. Never sign a financial report or a legal document unless one of them has signed it first; it makes them feel important and gives you an extra bit of security.

You are at risk every day you are the CEO. Never put yourself in a position where you have to confess you were not aware of a legal or financial problem in your firm. No one will believe you, and even if you can prove it, you are now blemished–you look weak. The jungle drums to replace you will start however faintly in some director’s head.

Your other direct reports are sales and marketing. Two different functions easily confused. Your marketing teams finds the product niche, designs the product, and your sales team executes. One is an introvert, the other an extrovert.

Next to report directly is operations, a critical function easily overlooked in your calendar. You need these people to perform every day. They are always under-appreciated and inevitably feel inferior. They are not from elite schools and don’t have trust funds, but you’ll notice that at the Christmas party they are wearing their finest clothes, so proud to be part of the firm.

If you are a technology company, then most likely you are the CTO. If you are not a technology company then the CTO is a plumber’s job, critical to have but is a part of operations. Their function is to keep information flowing internally and putting up firewalls to protect that flow.

If you are the CEO of a non tech company you must know enough about systems to be able to detect B..S when you hear it. You should have working knowledge of the Cloud, open systems, SaaS, the QA function, system security and data center redundancy to understand what your CTO is talking about when he comes asking for more money, which is inevitable. You’ll  notice that software system upgrades are numbered in decimals which leaves a lot of room for growth… for the vendor.

All your direct reports should have their offices in the immediate vicinity of their functional teams with the exception of the CTO and the General Counsel. Those two reports  should be next to you on the same floor. Avoid creating an “admiral’s row” of executives. Your direct reports should be located with their teams, fingers on the pulse of the business, not hanging around your office trying to look busy. You are running a business, not a social club.