Why Your Investment Banker Isn't Really On Your Side They Have the Wrong Incentives and Motivation When you’re going through the process of selling your business, one of the first steps you’ll make is to hire an investment banker. These are the guys and gals who are hyper-educated at the best sch...
KEEP READINGIt's a Critical Question for Your Success and Happiness One of the things most people don't think about when it comes to assessing their leadership style is what kind of organization they might best perform in and what they most enjoy. That can be an especially valuable question to ask if you are...
KEEP READINGIt's important to understand which one you want and need. Anytime you're looking to fill a position inside your business, especially when it comes to finding someone for your senior level C Suite, is a critical moment. The cost of missing on a hire can be enormous. That's why it can be helpful to...
KEEP READINGIt turns out there is a better way. One of the big issues every leader deals with on a daily basis is finding ways to motivate their people. It's often a question of what incentives they can employ to get people to engage and perform to their optimum levels. The default approach has l...
KEEP READINGWe might be pushing our kids in the wrong direction. We're all fans of education. I can admit that I'm a kind of an educational snob based on my own experience in pursuing advanced degrees. As a result, it's always been a foregone conclusion that my kids would also be heading to college to pursue...
KEEP READINGIt's a balance of brains and people skills. We live in a world where nearly every parent encourages their children to get good grades in school. Not only that, there might even be the expectation that their child get all A's--a perfect 4.0 grade point average--for their entire academic life. Anyt...
KEEP READINGIn a prior article, I talked about how it’s unlikely there will be a bidding war if you should ever put your business on the market. Part of the reason for that is that it can be difficult to attract the attention of multiple strategic buyers at the same time. The better bet, therefore, is to try...
KEEP READINGIf there is money on the table, take it off.We've all been trained for most of our lives to get the best deal we possibly can. And that makes sense most of the time, especially given all of the information that is now available to us. It's easy to try and get the best deal on, say, a car or TV se...
KEEP READINGSilence is the Source of Great Strength A book came out within the past few years that has become quite popular. It's called Quiet by Susan Cain, where she writes about the power of introverts to remain silent and focused in noisy world. Cain makes the argument that there can be times when saying...
KEEP READINGAnd there is an easy way to figure out which manager.Turnover of any kind inside a company can be problematic - especially these days where everyone in engaged in a war for talent. But that’s especially true when it comes to your star employees - the A players - who can be tough to replace no mat...
KEEP READINGRule #1 - Don't Stand Behind a Pie Ducker in a Food Fight We've all had the experience of working together with our boss or a co-worker developing an idea we have into something our firm can actually act on. Oftentimes, that can mean that you need your boss's help to push your plan up the ladder-...
KEEP READINGIt's Easy to Get Lost without a Roadmap When I reached a certain point in my career where my success had given me some resources to work with, my Dad gave me a great piece of advice. He told me, "You can now do anything you want to. But, you can't do everything you want." This sage advice meant ...
KEEP READINGIt's a Great Way to Align and Reward Your Team One of the most common questions I get asked by business leaders is: How do I create a profit-sharing or bonus plan? In fact, one CEO, a client of mine, recently posed this very question to me. The business was doing well, and the CEO wanted to find ...
KEEP READINGIt isn't Just Names in Boxes - Structure Makes the Strategy Happen A common question that gets brought up in our work with CEO peer groups is how organizations should be structured in order to achieve the best results. The issue CEOs struggle with is how to put people in positions whe...
KEEP READINGIt's Not Easy to Put the Next Generation in Place Many entrepreneurs who start and grow a business hope that someday their family--specifically their children--will take over running the company. Even better, the business would pass from generation to generation into the future. That's a legacy t...
KEEP READINGThey are hard to tell apart - so how do you pick the best one for you? If you are considering selling your company, I always advise my clients to first build the best support team they can. That means lining up lawyers and accountants that can provide the kind of advice you need to make the ...
KEEP READINGHarness the Law of Attraction to Achieve Your Goals Is there really something to the notion that, if we hold a thought in our mind over time, we can eventually, almost magically, bring it to life? This has been called the "Law of Attraction" and people like the author Richard Bach and his bo...
KEEP READINGEither They've Got it or They Don't - But There is Something We Can Do Many leaders I encounter think that the most important part of their job is to motivate people on a daily basis. But that's simply a myth because you can't motivate people. It's impossible -- motivation is intrinsic -- an...
KEEP READINGHow they were graded on this can predict their ability to be a good team member. There is a popular book series that's based on the idea that everything we need to know, we learned in kindergarten. There's some real truth to this. But I would like to take things in a different direction. I b...
KEEP READINGIt's Not Just Harder - It's 3 Times Harder Over my career as a business leader, I have done business in 27 different countries as just about every business I was involved in worked overseas in some capacity. So my piece of advice here today may seem counterintuitive. But I am hoping yo...
KEEP READINGYou are silently communicating how you value people's time .For some of us, the world can be divided into two kinds of people: those of us who show up on time, and those of us who are late. English writer Edward Verrall Lucas had a view on lateness, "I have noticed that the people who are late ar...
KEEP READINGDoes Your Employee Know They Are About to be Fired?I’ve had many managers report to me across my career as a leader and CEO. And over the years, many of those managers have come to me at different times to express a keen desire to fire one of their own direct reports.And every time that happened,...
KEEP READINGPut the bottom line up front to be a great communicator.When most people communicate or have an update to share at work, either in an email or with a verbal report, they love to share their entire intellectual journey. They tend to start at the beginning, and then explain everything they did to g...
KEEP READINGYou Need to Have Buffers to Handle the Ups and Downs of BusinessThere are probably dozens of traits that come to mind when you think of what sets great leaders apart from the rest of the pack. But one of the most important things that every great leader understands–something that other might miss...
KEEP READINGThis article is excerpted from the book Great CEOs Are Lazy (Inc. Original Imprint, 2016)A lot of the mediocre and hardworking CEOs we have run into over the years are exceptionally good at what we call “peanut buttering.” When it comes to allocating their time to the various tasks and stakeholde...
KEEP READINGYou can get an immediate jump in productivity.Accountability is a topic that lots of CEOs and leaders talk about. Specifically, most of their concern is that they don’t feel like their people hold themselves accountable to the things they need to do in driving higher levels of performance through...
KEEP READINGA three-tiered approach to the monetization of data that follows the framework of Aggregation, Analytics, and Actionable Predictions.Just about every business is awash in data these days. From data about your customers and their buying habits to data about the market in general, you have an enorm...
KEEP READINGThe best negotiators don’t look for win-win behaviors, they try to find a lose-lose compromise that everyone can accept.When it comes to negotiating a deal, we have all been taught to try and find a so-called “win-win” solution. But when you watch the best negotiators in action, they actually use...
KEEP READINGSuccessful people know that there are six kinds of power that you can earn in an organization and only a few of them are given by the company.What kind of power do you have in your organization? And by that I mean can you get other people to do what you want them to? While it’s become somewhat ou...
KEEP READINGWhat do you do when someone who is unquestionably brilliant is also a jerk?We all work with someone who is unquestionably brilliant. You know the type: the person who consistently comes up with great insights and ideas and who can cut to the quick far faster than anyone else in the organization. ...
KEEP READINGThousands of hours have been wasted talking about mission statements that are, quite frankly, boring. The best mission statements, are both inspirational and to the point.Mission statements are critically important to your organization because they drive alignment in your organization toward the ...
KEEP READINGIf you don’t learn to embrace the art of delegation, you won’t be able to build your business. The 70 percent rule gives you guidance on how to do it well.So when do you delegate a task? This central question stops many CEOs from moving tasks to their team.They wait until someone else is able to ...
KEEP READINGA great way to become a better leader – fastServing as the leader or CEO of an organization of any size can be a difficult and lonely job. Fortunately, there are many tools available to help you become a better leader–including things like going back to school to get your MBA, reading books, and,...
KEEP READINGIf you consistently create high value time – you can double your incomeIf you ask any businessperson what the most valuable thing they can do, they all likely have the same answer: work on their billable hours.They’re right–that is the most valuable thing you can do with your time. Think about if...
KEEP READINGGreat leaders and managers know these 3 Simple Steps To Hold People AccountableThere is a common theme that many leaders struggle with: they don’t know how to hold their people accountable. Even if they are great at hiring A players, many leaders still are left with that feeling that their people...
KEEP READINGWith the New Year right around upon us, here are 5 trends that will impact your business in 2018 and beyond:1. Lack of “Place” AcceleratesIn the coming year, we will continue to see a diminished importance of the need to have a physical location to work in. Thanks to the widespread evolution of m...
KEEP READINGBeing the leader of a business isn’t always glamourous. More often than not, your time is going to be spent figuring out where your company went wrong.In the book Great CEOs Are Lazy (Inc. Original Imprint, 2016), leadership consultant Jim Schleckser argues that the best CEOs aren’t the ones who ...
KEEP READINGIt all begins with answering a crucial question: What makes your business unique?Southwest Airlines, Google and the Ritz Carlton are three of the most successful companies around. But what makes each of them so successful?The answer is that all three of these companies have a crystal clear unders...
KEEP READINGIt’s a question many CEOs start asking when their company reaches a certain size: Is it time for me to look for an advisory board?It’s worth noting that the question relates to creating an “advisory board” which is very different than a board of directors or fiduciary board, which involves legal ...
KEEP READINGEventually you can’t count on superhero employees and have to deploy systems if you want to scale.In the earliest days of most companies, entrepreneurs can’t afford the systems that exist in bigger companies. Instead, entrepreneurs rely on hiring super-talented people skilled in doing everything ...
KEEP READINGWhile lots of mergers fail, and if you had to pick one reason – it is companies rushing in without really vetting the potential match.It seems there is news everyday about a proposed merger or acquisition between two companies. While buying another company is certainly a viable strategy for helpi...
KEEP READINGSharing equity with your team can be a powerful motivator, and there are two basic ways most firms do it.In a prior article, I talked about the reasons why it might be time for you to share equity with your team.But that brings us to today’s topic, which is how you can give equity to your team.In...
KEEP READINGKids and employees have an amazing ability to pick up on when our behaviors don’t match up with our words.For those of you who are parents, you will be all too familiar with the fact that we tend to say one thing, but do another – which is something our kids are great at pointing out. Kids have a...
KEEP READINGEvery business has the occasional fire. When it hits, you should have plenty of people who we call “Firefighters” while avoiding folks we label “Snow Cones.“Every business, from successful startups to well-established corporate giants, hits a rough patch or two. It’s just a part of doing business...
KEEP READINGWarren Buffett knows great financials are critical to the success of any business, they are really just outcomes from having a strong “machine” and an impenetrable “moat” for your business.When you ask most CEOs about their vision for their business, they usually give you an answer built around m...
KEEP READINGA word of caution for any entrepreneur who has founded a business and remains active in it: you might need to fire your CEO – yourself.Of course, every owner of a growing business knows what it’s like to play multiple roles. But let’s focus on the distinction between two of them: owner and CEO.Wh...
KEEP READINGEvery year, I speak with nearly a thousand CEOs in detail about their companies. One of the key topics that I talk to all those CEOs about is their strategy for achieving future growth. Whether that’s expanding a business geographically, or even by entering new emerging markets, every CEO has a c...
KEEP READINGWhen you’re hiring, think beyond the skills and experience a candidate might have and assess whether you want a patriot or a mercenary.When you’re thinking about hiring people, especially those in mission-critical-type positions, you need to use caution because the stakes are so high anytime you ...
KEEP READINGMany companies rate their talent well above average. Besides being untrue, this is a dangerous strategy as your top performers will leave you if you do.In the mythical town of Lake Wobegon, made famous by Garrison Keillor on National Public Radio, it is said that all the children are above averag...
KEEP READINGTo get the best value when sell your business, keep your focus on building a great business, serving your clients, growing your revenue and profits and exit will take care of itself.Many of the CEOs and leadership teams I have worked with over the years have fallen into the same trap: they get ov...
KEEP READINGBusiness partnerships fail frequently. But we can learn from how people in good marriages manage their relationships to improve the odds.Starting a business is no small endeavor, especially if you’re doing it alone. That’s which why many entrepreneurs choose to partner up. Having a partner helps ...
KEEP READINGThousands of hours have been wasted talking about mission statements that are, quite frankly, boring. The best mission statements, are both inspirational and to the point.Mission statements are critically important to your organization because they drive alignment in your organization toward the ...
KEEP READINGThere is a single question that you can use to assess whether candidates understand the job and if they are A or C players.The secret to hiring your next great employee might come down to how someone answers a single question. And you won’t be asking what kind of tree the person would be or about...
KEEP READINGWhen it comes to communicating about your strategy with your organization, and ensuring you don’t out think it, the phrase to remember is: keep it short and sweet.Everyone who runs a successful business believes that they have the best people working for them. And that’s no accident since we inve...
KEEP READINGGreat leaders focus in on what we can call the “Talk/Do” ratio. Put simply, they measure how much their employees talk and communicate compared to how much work they actually get done.How do you go about evaluating the talent in your organization? There are obviously many different performance me...
KEEP READINGThis article is excerpted from the book Great CEOs Are Lazy (Inc. Original Imprint, 2016)A lot of the mediocre and hardworking CEOs we have run into over the years are exceptionally good at what we call “peanut buttering.” When it comes to allocating their time to the various tasks and stakeholde...
KEEP READINGWhat do you do when someone who is unquestionably brilliant is also a jerk?We all work with someone who is unquestionably brilliant. You know the type: the person who consistently comes up with great insights and ideas and who can cut to the quick far faster than anyone else in the organization. ...
KEEP READINGMission drift is an irresistible force. You need to build in measures to help you avoid suffering from this crisis of identity. If you don’t, you might end up running a company that is very different than the one you intended to build.As every company gets older and matures, especially around its...
KEEP READINGGreat CEOs accept that in order to innovate, then failure isn’t an option – it’s required and part of a healthy learning process. However, they make sure they are a “One Trial Learner.”If you hang out with CEOs all the time like I do, you hear a lot of talk about some are worried about making mis...
KEEP READINGWarren Buffett, who has billions of reasons to be worried, uses these six steps to free himself from worry and you can too.We all know Warren Buffett is one of the most successful investors of all time. He has literally made billions of dollars through the savvy investments he’s made over the yea...
KEEP READINGAccording to many iconic leaders, simple is hard, but it’s also an incredible advantage. So if you make time to make things simple, your customers will thank you.The French philosopher and mathematician Blaise Pascal once penned a letter to a friend in which, at the end, he wrote: “If I had more ...
KEEP READINGYou need information to take the risk out of decisions, but getting too much information has a real cost. Most normal business decisions can be made with 75 percent of the available information, focused on the right issues.I have written before about people who have high information needs. You mi...
KEEP READINGThe best leaders never waste a good crisis because it affords them the chance to make the kind of large wholesale changes their organization needs. They let the fire do some of the work for them to make the organization receptive to change.In your journey as a CEO or entrepreneur, you will inevit...
KEEP READINGGreat companies look at the skill and the will of the potential hire, but they spend just as much time on cultural fit. And many use these four simple questions to determine that fit.When most people go about the process of hiring on a new employee, they tend to focus on “skill” and “will.” In ot...
KEEP READINGOne thing that all great CEOs have in common is that they have control over their calendar. Here are six questions to see if you have control over your schedule.As part of my job, I talk to hundreds of CEOs every year trying to identify the elements that separates great leaders from average ones....
KEEP READINGGreat CEOs rarely enter into Player Mode. Rather, his or her first move is to find someone else to do the work.When most CEOs find their company getting into some kind of bind, they jump in to personally help resolve the issue. We call this going into “Player Mode.” “I’m just helping out for now,...
KEEP READINGNot all recurring revenue business models equally valuable. You can think of it as a scale with five levels where the higher your business model falls on the scale, the more valuable it is. And the key to value in this case is making it hard for competitors to take your customers while also makin...
KEEP READINGOne truth in business that most CEOs and entrepreneurs alike tend to overlook: not all revenue is created equal. Sure, a dollar in sales is a dollar in sales. But the more predictable that dollar is, as in the more likely that you will receive that dollar from your customer every month, the more ...
KEEP READINGOne of the most challenging tasks for any leader is figuring out what to do with an underperforming team member in your organization– a C player. The challenge is that your employee might be a good person, probably someone who has even bought into the values of your culture. The simple answer is ...
KEEP READINGDo you have a great business? One thing I’ve learned from coaching hundreds of entrepreneurs is that just about every one of them thinks they have a “great” business model. Do you? If you want to test how great your business really is, ask yourself how it rates on the following four factors:Lots ...
KEEP READINGEveryone might think they have the best people working for them, but sitting down and doing some objective evaluation on the kinds of players you really have inside is tough. Do you have the talent you need to keep growing your organization? Everyone might think they have the best people working ...
KEEP READINGSo when do you delegate a task? This central question stops many CEOs from moving tasks into their team. They wait until someone else is able to complete the tasks as well as they can and thus doom themselves to owning that task forever.Smart CEOs, on the other hand, use the “70% Rule.” Put simpl...
KEEP READINGA key question every CEO faces is how they can get out of Player mode and spend more time in high-leverage roles. The secret to getting there is the “Not-Do” list. Everyone has a To-Do list. It helps us stay focused and organized. It’s also an easy place to park things that we think we should be ...
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