Title Or A Mindset?

Over the years the role of a CEO has changed as he's taking new strides and
donning new roles. Some lessons for SPs

A CEO by definition is someone who is the overall head of an organization and
responsible for the entire organization's operations-be it sales, marketing,
finance, human resources, delivery, customer support, alliances, product
management, quality, etc.

The Evolving Role

Traditionally, there has always been one CEO for an organization. Each
organization may be a part of a larger group of companies, however one
organization has one CEO. As an exception to this, Azim Premji's successful
concept of duo CEO is quite encouraging and aspiring. It is easier said than
done.

Here, it is an effort to open a dialog and a discussion on-'Is CEO a title or
a mindset'. In today's global and competitive world, everyone in an organization
necessarily sells and competes-both internally as well as externally. One may
have internal customers and/or external customers. Everyone has to sell and
compete for their respective visibility and growth within the organization,
industry, and marketplace as a whole.

The concept of back-end function is no more relevant. Everyone in the
organization is expected to be an integral part of business strategy and
execution. Everyone, irrespective of function, has to align oneself with
business vision, goals and objectives. Everyone is expected to add value in the
entire supply chain in delivering goods/services to end customers. Quality and
finance are examples of such a gradual change.

Finance is not about cost control, but it is all about adding value in
winning businesses and achieving higher bottomline through excellence. Everyone
in the organization has to be cautious about productivity of cost (PoC) and not
necessarily reducing cost. Cost optimization helps both ways: a) optimal
utilization of resources, hence higher efficiency and enhanced effectiveness;
and b) straight contribution to the bottomline. Cost optimization at work is no
different than managing money matters in personal life. It is a matter of
extending the personal standards and practices at workplace.

Leading from the Front

Beyond a point, by far, everyone has people reporting to. Team size is a
factor of discipline/function, organization size, level in the organization.
However, the fact remains that one needs to look into individual's issues like
welfare, personal and career growth, grooming, training and orientation,
compensation, etc. Being the leader at the helm for the people reporting, one
has the ownership and commitment to its people. At times, a leader needs to also
touch upon personal aspects of his/her team mates. A leader should understand
his/her people in the best way; hence one can decide things most appropriately
for team mates. Therefore, people look at the leader for anything and
everything.

Qualitative assessment and people surviving/growing on whims and fancies is a
concept of yesteryear. Slowly, it is vanishing and losing its space. It is all
about keep achieving higher excellence and strive for enhanced contribution in
the organization's growth. Negative pressures can be counter-productive and
killing for not only the individuals but also the organization. Continuous
building of leadership and higher excellence within (as an individual and/or
teams) is the name of the game.

Managing the Ecosystem

Everyone has certain defined and mutually agreed key result areas (KRA) to
deliver within the organization. Most activities have set of dependencies. The
dependencies could be internal and/or external within
team/organization/industry/marketplace. That is where the challenge lies. A fact
still remains: everyone is expected to manage these dependencies and deliver
results.

Dependencies cannot be reasons for non-delivery and/or non-performance. It is
both science and art to manage these challenges as they are evolutionary in
nature. As one grows and progresses, challenges keep changing. In today's ever
competitive world, just doing the best and not managing the ecosystem in terms
of working together and positioning does not work fully; on the contrary only
managing ecosystem and not delivering is certainly not long lasting as well.
Perception matters, hence one needs to look into perception aspect as well let
it be unconsciously and business as usual.

A Mindgame

So, is CEO a title or a mindset? Few will continue to be CEO by title, but
why should the rest feel deprived of being a CEO. In one's own way, everyone can
be a CEO in action and spirit. However, the truth will prevail that everyone
will not become a designated CEO.

Being a CEO or 'not' being a CEO is a mind game. One might be a designated as
a CEO, but still not a CEO in action and spirit; while some can be CEO through
their action and leadership qualities; despite not being formally designated as
a CEO. One of the very critical characteristics of a CEO (designated or in
mindset) would continue to be 'insecurity management'. Higher the level, higher
will be the insecurities.

As a CEO has to perform sales and marketing function in response to their
respective industry and market share, people in the organization have to achieve
so versus their peers within and across functions and the marketplace. CEO is
responsible to the company's shareholders for excellence in everything, in the
same way everyone equally responsible for their own teams and contribution in
the entire ecosystem within the organization. It is now equally important and
significant for designated a CEO to offer a comprehensive and conducive
environment to the people in the organization to perform and excel. If people
concerned in the organization become CEO actors, the pressure and challenge
would be on designated CEO(s) to keep ever-evolving their own definition of a
CEO. A designated CEO must lead by example-in terms of the way he/she walks,
talks, laughs and communicates!

Sudhir Aggarwal

The author was heading Sify's governance business previously

(Source: DQ)