Just a new one I heard - CEO Disease. Have you got it?

Wow!! It is good to be back. It is been four months since I last wrote something. But these four months have been pretty dramatic in my life - lost my dear dad to cancer, have a new job and am in a distant relationship (do not worry folks.. still married and faithful to my lovely wife) I just work in a different town now and she just stayed back home taking care of our boys...

Well... in these last four months I have been thinking and doing a sort of retrospection on why and what was it that made me change a job every time I did it... What answers did I give during the interview to the typical interview question - Why are you looking for a change?

And I came up with these few standard answers that we all may give or may have given during that job change interview (depending at what stage of your career one is)...

• I am moving for a better opportunity
• I am looking for a challenging and rewarding assignment
• I am looking for a challenging, fulfilling and satisfacting assignement wherein I could contribute more to the business
• I wanted to be an entrepreneur

and the list can go on depending how innovative one is in coming up with something better... 

Well... here is one that I heard about recently... a person let go a job because his / her boss suffered from the "CEO Disease". Wow!! "CEO Disease"... now what's that?

Well... "CEO Disease"... as the literature defines it is - 

A behavior pattern that has been observed among Chief Executive Officers (CEO) who become intoxicated with power and perks of office. Symptoms include believing in their own omnipotence, surrounding themselves with yes-men and responding brutally to any opposition. (http://www.termwiki.com/EN:CEO_disease)

This behavior pattern (again as available literature on the subject says) could be but not limited to -

• treating the company as his / her private fiefdom
• believing that the s/he and the company is one and hence can take what s/he wants and when s/he wants

More importantly, the question is - How does one tell if one is suffering from it or have early symptoms of the "CEO Disease". Well... here are some pointers to find out by taking a look at your own practices as an executive...

• Are you changing direction so very frequently that you seem to be driving your spouse, your colleagues, or your clients "up the wall"?
• Are you giving an impression to your colleagues that you can do no wrong, refusing to concede any mistake?
• Is the decision more important to you than the decision-making process and details?
• Do you like people who yes your every whim?
• Are you overly concerned where you sit in a meeting or expect people to rise when you enter a room?
• Do you relish media attention - not especially for the company but for personal gain?
• Do colleagues think that you treat practical concerns about stability, capacity, and leadership as signs of disloyalty, laziness, or the most deadly sin of all - technical and managerial ignorance?

Now... wait a minute.. can a CIO ever be infected with the "CEO Disease"? Well.. perhaps yes... in fact the "CEO Disease" can get to anyone.

Imagine... the result of a case of Top Management Executive suffering from a real "bad" infection of the "disease" on the overall company performance - the company turnover could tremble and go downhill and employee turnaround could soar, investors could get nervous, and sales may drop because the salespeople may end up not been sure what to sell. Project Management could stall and employees may have a glazed-look most of the time. It can get really worse if all the "vision-lacking" employees  are fired in the hope of getting "better" ones. More importantly, when the money would run out, the Top Management Executive believing in his / her "Midas Touch" could attempt to simply go out and get more millions taking the company in deeper and murky waters and towards a major financial crisis and even a complete closure of operations.

Imagine - what could happen if an company's problem is not a lack of vision but too much of it? what could happen when the vision changes monthly or even weekly?

Scary right? But, there is a cure and hope...

Though I am no expert on this, I believe that the cure is pretty simple and easy if, 

• you are willing to accept that you have a problem on hand, and
• you really want to do something about it and you really really mean to 

I believe it is important to create an environment of inclusive growth wherein the ideas and opinions and views of one's team members are sought for and the team members too feel confident and comfortable in sharing their views / concerns and giving their opinions. Ask questions - is there a better way to do it? how can it be handled differently? Get the team's buy in on your project / initiative. 

Secondly, learn to admit and fix your mistakes. This takes a lot of courage to do this. Remember, we do not live in a "perfect" world and most importantly, we are human beings and human beings are not "perfect". As the Hindu mythology tells us, if you are perfect you are GOD and invincible and human beings are not invincible. Learn to say - "I made a mistake and I was wrong".  

Thirdly, please please for GODsake discourage those sycophants who try to "suck up" to every word you say, who make you feel good with their seductive accolades. If you really want to make the difference - Fire the sycophants!!

Reward mistakes because at least the people tried to make a difference, help them understand and learn from the mistakes. They were different and may really have a genuine and possibly the "real" solution but may have failed because of other reasons. Encourage a culture of experimentation and continuous learning and innovation.

Communicate, communicate, communicate across reporting lines... Please remember as a Top Management Executive the information that you receive has been filtered and fine tuned multiple times by multiple people and subordinates. The ground reality may be quite different and all you have is the filtered information and not the really "juice". It really helps to have your ear to the ground.
  
Lastly, respect your people. Every person of the team has a role to play and the corporate engine works smoothly, efficiently and effectively when all - the BIG and SMALL pieces of the corporate structure work together and insync. Every person's role is important and needs to be respected for the role s/he plays.