I was reading a wonderful book “THE FIVE TEMPTATIONS OF A CEO” by PARTRICK LENCIONI. I thought of sharing some important reasons for failure of CEO’s from the book.
- Choosing Status over Results: To focus on one career and status above the focus on the company’s result that makes CEO complacent and unfocused and causes results to slip.
- Choosing Popularity over Accountability: The need to be liked and popular with staff at expenses of holding them accountable.
- Choosing Certainty over Clarity: Even if CEO is not overly concerned about being liked by staff, he fail to hold them accountable as he often does not like the things to be decided without perfect information and that leads to things become ambiguously, without making clear and timely decisions because he don’t want to be wrong and lose his reputation in front of his staff.
- Choosing Harmony over Productive Conflict: CEO’s are afraid of conflict, to put their ideas on the line where they might be challenged so they don’t benefit from the various opinions and ideas of their people and often lands making bad decisions.
- Choosing Invulnerability over trust: No one loves to admit wrong but some people hate. They mistakenly believe that they lose creditability if their people feel too comfortable challenging their ideas.
To conclude, CEO’s should identify the presence of above temptations in them and work hard to remove them to become a successful CEO.