Evolving into a CEO

The simple but insightful article published in BusinessLine on 3rd March, 2008 by V. K. Madhav Mohan is reproduced below.

Every young manager aspires to become a CEO, but sadly only a few make it. The top of the pyramid is unforgivingly narrow! The road to the top is long and hard and very, very slippery. Traversing this tortuous path calls for steely determination, hard work and a host of other attributes. You don’t wave a magic wand, say abracadabra and become a CEO: you have to evolve into a CEO.

Evolution by definition is long term. Myriad experiences over many, many years help you assimilate and synthesize learning, attitude and skill into excellence and leadership. Along the way you are bound to suffer setbacks and distractions. That’s when you learn to be mentally tough and remain positive.

So how do you evolve into a CEO?

First, ensure that you learn the intricacies of every aspect of management and business, not just your specialty. The CEO must have a solid grasp of all functional areas apart from a thorough understanding of the dynamics of the external environment. So, right from the beginning of your career you must consciously create a career path that rotates you through marketing, sales, finance, manufacturing, HR and technology. Else, you’ll arrive at the doorstep of the CEO’s office without the requisite managerial bandwidth. And then it’ll be too late!

Second, build and nourish relationships not only within your organization but also outside. Relationships are long term and need huge investments in time, effort and care. You have to give without worrying about what you get! That guarantees an infinite lifetime ROI from relationships. Relationships create strong networks that are preconditions for success in the 21st century.

Third, get your work-life balance right. Commit to fitness (mental and physical) by making time for exercise, entertainment and meditation. The higher you go, the more stress you’ll encounter. Therefore you’ll need to build your capacity to deflect and dissipate stress. And that you can do very effectively by staying light and nimble through exercise and meditation.

Fourth, commit to lifelong learning. It’s important to understand that your ability to learn, like your ability to listen, atrophies with disuse. If you learn continuously you retain your mental sharpness and memory well into the eighties and you can even ward off Alzheimer’s disease and senile dementia. In any case, Moore’s Law (chip level computing capability doubles every 18 months) has ensured that the rate of obsolescence of knowledge is exponential. So, much of your stock of old knowledge is being rendered obsolete in real-time. Learning is therefore a survival imperative!

Fifth, prevent your ego from interfering with your decisions. Learn to minimize the impact of your own likes and dislikes and maximize the welfare of your organization and your team. Eliminate the tendency to talk about yourself and hog the credit; instead, let your results do the talking.

View the whole picture:
In every situation, learn to unravel intertwined issues and then view the whole picture. When you have trained yourself like this for a long time, top-quality decision-making will come naturally to you.

And above all, maintain an iron clad commitment to personal integrity. The combination of personal integrity with consistent delivery of results is simply unbeatable because your credibility can then be universally accepted. Remember that a lot of the time it’s not what is being said that’s important; it’s who is saying it that’s paramount. As a CEO this kind of credibility is the foundation of your success. If you evolve along these lines, you can open the door with confidence when the opportunity to become CEO knocks.

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