One Way Many Midsized Firms Fail: Through ‘Mother May I’ Management
After 45 years in business, In-Common Laboratories in 2012 was suffering from a revolving door that no company wants to face: three CEOs in three years. Many challenging issues precipitated a 2010 board decision to find a new CEO for the not-for-profit provider of medical laboratory tests. In 2011, the board realized it hired the wrong CEO (No. 2) for a variety of reasons, including precipitous losses. But it wasn’t until the third CEO, Kris Bailey, showed up in 2012 that the board realized the problems ran much deeper: a “Mother May I” culture that had turned the top team into powerless managers whose ingenuity was running on cruise control.
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Robert Sher is founding principal of CEO to CEO, a consulting firm of former chief executives that improves the leadership infrastructure of midsized companies seeking to accelerate their performance. He was chief executive of Bentley Publishing Group from 1984 to 2006 and steered the firm to become a leading player in its industry (decorative art publishing).