Some unsolicited advice: 13 things a CEO doesn’t want to hear
If you like this, check out 15+ Ways a Venture Capitalists Says No and The Uber of Startup Lingo.
Many (non-CEO) people think that CEOs just bark out orders all day, but nothing could be further from the truth. Sure, CEOs have to make lots of decisions, give input, and direct people, but a big part of the job is listening to what others have to say. Some of the best CEOs are the best listeners.
As a company grows, a CEO can’t possibly understand everything that is going in the various departments first-hand, so it’s important to maintain good lines of communication with everyone in the company. I’ve gone as far as conducting periodic 1:1s with everyone in my company all the way up to 50 employees. It’s a lot of meetings, but nothing replaces 1:1 communication.
That said, 1:1 communication sucks sometimes too.
You are not always going to get the best news. In fact, you won’t get good news a lot of the time. Some days you want to put a sign outside your open office desk that reads: Bad news bucket is full. Come back tomorrow.
What kind of bad news does a CEO hear? I’m going to give you several examples from different types of people you interact with both inside and outside the company.
A random employee
Can I see you for a second in a conference room?
This set up has never resulted in good news in the history of business. 99% of the time the employee is submitting their resignation. Especially if you get this question from an employee that you talk to infrequently, you are guaranteed to be updating your voluntary attrition numbers later that day.
I’m always very accommodating when an employee approaches me in this scenario. Often they are pretty nervous about submitting their resignation. Next time I see an employee approach me in this way, I should try avoiding them like the plague. Would they eventually just email me? Would they eventually give up and not resign?
Head of Engineering
We need to rewrite our platform from scratch.
Every programmer I’ve ever met (including myself) gets frustrated/tired/bored with their own code after a while and wants to rewrite it — especially if they are maintaining someone else's code. And they always think it will be so much better the next time around. Fortunately, there is plenty of sage advice on the Internet (because where else do you get sage advice these days) NOT to rewrite large codes bases. Ever. Don’t take it from me, listen to Joel Spolsky. In general, it’s not a good idea and you have a high probability of encountering the second-system effect.
Head of HR
The latest survey shows our employees are disengaged.
Nothing like a good ol’ employee survey to dash the spirits of the management team. Just when you’ve planned the holiday party and shared the rosy outlook for the next year, you get results from the quarterly employee survey that shows everyone hates you. And it’s probably because your kitchen gets restocked only once a week instead of twice. I’ll never forget the time a relatively new employee approached me (the CEO) to ask when we would be refilling the KIND bars in the kitchen because they are kinda low. The KIND bars, I asked? Yes, the KIND bars.
Head of Marketing
We need to rewrite our website.
This is the marketing version of the “it’s time to rewrite our software” that the Head of Engineering asks about periodically. No one ever seems happy with your website and the disdain grows over time until your Head of Marketing starts building up steam to convince you to spend the money to redesign it for the 10th time. This time we have a much better handle on our ICP (ideal customer profile) so we can tailor the site and they will bang down our door. Heck, our website might be so good we won’t need any other marketing activities. And it will only take six weeks, they promise!
Head of Sales
I don’t think we are going to hit our number.
Ha! The question isn’t whether your Head of Sales is going to say this statement, but just the frequency in which they are going to say it. Once a quarter, once a month, once a week? All good salespeople run a little anxious. Knowing just how anxious your salesperson is will be key to maintaining your sanity. Does “I don’t think we are going to hit our number” really mean “we’re going to meet but not exceed the number” or does it mean “we’re going to miss our number by a mile?” It all comes down to your definition of “miss.”
Chief Information Security Officer
*Anything*
I love infosec people, but let’s face it, they are in the bad news business. It’s all about mitigating risk and avoiding catastrophe. I hate recurring meetings, but I kind of like them with infosec because it gives you a reason to talk to your head of security without fearing the worst.
Primary contact at your largest customer
I wanted to let you know that I’m pursuing a new opportunity at another company…
You’ve spent months and maybe even years cultivating a relationship with your best customer just to see it crumble away when your primary contact decides to be selfish and focus on their career by changing jobs.
Transitioning to a new contact rarely goes well. The new person is getting up to speed with dozens of relationships of which you are just one that’s likely not very important. The new contact isn’t aware of all the nice things you did for the previous contact. It’s like starting from scratch.
Anyone in your house
*Cough* *Cough*
You may have nannies and grandparents waiting by the phone to help you out as soon as anyone in your house isn’t feeling well, but in mine, we go on full lock-down. Someone getting sick means one of two things. It’s either 1) a major disruption to my schedule, or 2) major guilt because I’m getting to “enjoy” work while my significant other is cleaning vomit off the carpet. Neither are great.
Your child
When are you going to get off your computer?
Hit me where it hurts. Let’s face it. We all worry about sitting down for Thanksgiving in 20 years and hearing stories about how we unavailable for our kids' childhood and were completely distracted by work during their formative years. The only question is what age will your kids figure this out and use it against you?
Board member
I think you should do this (completely obvious bad idea you already considered)
I’ve written about what people really think during a board meeting. The way it works is your board attends a meeting once a quarter to hear about your company and give you feedback and input after having thought about your problems for 5 minutes. It means you’ll often get lots of advice you’ve already considered and disregarded.
(Please no comments about how “good boards” don’t work this way because they give great advice.)
Potential investor
We love your company, but we are in between funds
There are so many ways an investor can turn you down that I wrote an entire post dedicated to the topic.
Airline pilot
Your flight has been delayed and the ETA is TBD.
Anyone that has done any amount of business travel has experienced this one. It seems like airline reliability has gotten worse in recent years, but maybe I’m just grousing. I’ve been burned enough now that as soon as I hear about a delay, I get on with the airline to see what other options are available.
Primary competitor
We are happy to announce an innovative and new, first of its kind product (that’s exactly like what you launched last year)
In the grand scheme of things, I think competition is pretty low on the list of things that a CEO should be worried about, but that said, we are competitive animals so it still irks me when our main competition announces something as if they are the only one to have done it.
Wait, there is good news!
You might be thinking that nothing I’ve covered here is all that bad. And you’d be right! It’s all about perspective. We like to talk about how hard it is to run a company, but I think it’s a great and fulfilling career. Most of the issues above don’t compare to your company running out of money and needing to shut down the business completely, or worse yet, a loved one getting sick. That really does suck. Getting a bad report about your employee survey, while annoying, is something you can fix.
Whining about your job from time-to-time can be cathartic, which is what I’m doing here. But the reality is I feel very fortunate to be in my position and I will take these “problems” all day long over most alternatives. Now it’s time to roll up the sleeves and get back to work.
