Break Your CEO Out Of His Gated Community
The corporate and personal lifestyles of top execs often lead them on a path of isolation. Eventually they lose touch with employees, customers, and market trends.
As Bryant University professor Michael Roberto puts it:
Far too many senior executives at large companies become isolated in the corner office. Their professional lives involve a series of handlers -- people who take their calls, screen their email, drive them places, run errands for them, etc. They live in gated communities, travel in first class, and stay at five-star hotels.
Chief executives must fight against this gravitational tug toward complacent comfortableness, Roberto says in his Harvard Online post. Here is the action list.- Honest conversation. Talk to employees and customers sans script.
- Watch customer behavior. Forget reports -- go watch in person how customers react to your products.
- Join the front line. Get thee to an assembly line and do some real work for a day.
- Youth movement. Interact with young employees to hear first hand about new trends and different perspectives.
(Gated community image by Wesley Fryer, CC 2.0)