A note to CEOs and their leadership teams:
I consult with CEOs and their executive teams to improve leadership and organizational performance. Senior leaders are like everyone else, of course, except that the consequences of your action – what you say, what you do, how you respond to challenges – should affect the actions of many others – sometimes hundreds and thousands of others.
The key skill for senior leaders is to get people moving in unison toward a clearly defined common objective, doing the right things with the right people in the right way. Unfortunately, simply being clear about what needs to be done is rarely sufficient to generate strong organizational action.
Having a clear idea or strategy or vision is challenging.
But making choices about what to do and what not to, clearly communicating those choices to the rest of the organization, and getting key people – some of whom may not agree with you or may not even want you to succeed – to fully embrace those choices and lead their people in the right direction is far more challenging. And far more important.
That’s what I help CEOs and their leadership teams do.
I’ve asked a few clients to talk about the experience of working with me. They aren’t true “case studies” in the Harvard Business School sense; rather, they’re collages of challenges and responses, and they say at least as much about my clients as about me.
Whether you read them because you’re thinking of hiring me, or to discover what goes into a successful CEO/Outside Advisor relationship, or to explore ways to be more effective in what you do, listen on two levels.
One level consists of the things you can see that I do: advisory conversations, strategy offsites, one-on-one coaching sessions – the tools of my work.
The other level, invisible but arguably much more important, is the quality of the relationships my clients have with me, with their senior teams, and with themselves. I’m fortunate to have clients who recognize that in order to lead others, they must first work on themselves.
I’m privileged to work with great leaders and great teams, and I’m inspired on a daily basis by their dedication to self-growth, the growth of others in their organizations, and the difference their organizations can make in the world.
Here are some of their stories of our work together. Enjoy…
| CEO, Hedge Fund | |
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Every CEO knows the feeling of not being sure how to get to their goals, how to navigate the obstacles to success. This CEO hired me when he needed direct, outside, impartial help in guiding his firm to change.
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| CEO, $800 Million High Tech Company | |
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This CEO needed to build and manage a team, and communicate effectively across a global company. Working with scientists, he had to create a culture where they accepted change as progress rather than resisting it, and steer a group of high-powered, opinionated, arrogant executives to deal with the important stuff.
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| CEO, Software Company Purchased by Oracle | |
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After a crunch period, they found themselves in an aggressive growth period, facing all kinds of internal challenges. They had a young, inexperienced, and motivated management team trying to address big new opportunities, scrambling to organize themselves and execute effectively. They wanted and needed guidance that they couldn’t get internally. That’s when they brought me in, to act as a sounding board, coach, and guide.
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| CEO, Financial Services Company with $90 Billion in Assets | |
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This CEO’s team was made up of incredibly talented people, but most of them had issues that were getting in the way of their effectiveness. One was rubbing people the wrong way by clumsy communications. Another wasn’t being clear with direct reports and wasn’t managing people effectively. A third needed to be more proactive; he wasn’t having hard conversations that needed to happen. This CEO hired me to turn this group into an effective and inspiring leadership team.
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| Global Head of HR, $2 Billion Financial Services Company | |
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This senior leader was charged with quickly building and maturing the HR function of a growing company. The key challenges included building an effective leadership team out of some “interesting” characters, and designing an optimal organization structure. He brought me in to run offsites and training, and to guide the executive team to take responsibility for finding solutions rather than griping about problems.
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| President/COO, 100 Person Financial Services Company | |
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Trying to move the organization forward, the President and CEO were struggling to understand the cultural and human causes of business problems. They hired me to guide them to shape messages and anticipate the implications of each potential course of action.
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