CEO Think: Blog
How Savvy Midsize Firms Increase Sales in a Virtual World
Description: Data shows that maintaining customer relations was a huge challenge for midsize companies in 2020. In-person sales is often a crucial differentiator for these companies, which have fewer resources to put into digital selling tools and training than larger firms. But some midsize companies have adapted to virtual selling and have not only held their own during the pandemic, but increased sales. They’ve done so by using online connections to humanize interactions, creating greater sales process efficiencies, and bursting out of traditional geographic boundaries.
Bigger Isn’t Always Better: Downshifting To Mighty Midsized
Ambitious midsized firms often have size envy – jealous of big corporations with more money, more leaders, more reach, and convincing themselves that big is better. Growing a company is clearly a desired end result, but building a powerful team delivering quality product and absolute customer satisfaction is what delivers that result. Big companies often fail to do so.
Hey Boss: Your Team Isn’t Supposed To Help You
The company needs to grow, to change, to move. There is an opportunity, a risk, an idea. Leadership sees it clearly, but the teams won’t progress fast enough. When the challenge is set out, they find obstacles, not solutions. They focus on immediate issues but not the innovation. The pace is slow, results don’t come. The teams simply do not rise to the challenge. Where’s the urgency?
How To Reduce Costly Employee Turnover: Assign Mentors On Day 1
A company goes to great pains to recruit top talent, but they fumble the onboarding and lose a great hire within the first few months. Sad. Without the right approach to help new employees settle, these fresh relationships can break. All too frequently, something goes wrong, and within a year, the excited new employee is disgruntled – and then gone. Maybe it was them, maybe it was the company – either way, time and effort has been wasted, the process has to start all over again, and the challenge of finding, recruiting and onboarding talented new staff remains. Isn’t there a better way?
Growing Your Own Talent
Midsized companies spend a lot of effort on external recruitment but often fail to recognize raw talent already within their company. Often times, they lack staff training departments and don’t devote the time and effort required to develop staff and plan challenging development programs to bring out their best.
How High Potentials Drive Their Own Career
While most talented employees inevitably find their way up the company ladder, many others get stuck in dead-end jobs and trapped in a comfort zone that does not help them get ahead. What can those with high potential do to ensure they are challenged, developed and ultimately successful in their careers?
Trust is a Critical Factor in Your Success
By Megan Patton
Principal and People Practice Leader
When people think of trust in the workplace, it is usually along the lines of, “Can I trust you to do what you are supposed to do?” or “Will Joe get the report done on time?” or “Will Mary create contracts that are ironclad?” But there is actually a great deal more involved in true workplace trust.
How to Keep Your Company Culture Strong In Depressing, Isolating Times
By Preety Adams
Community Engagement Manager
The days of stopping by the water cooler for a chat with co-workers seem like a distant memory. As Covid-19 continues to impact our daily lives, many employees are missing the spirit and culture that companies work so hard to build and maintain. They are working remotely from home, spending long days alone, without even the solace of driving in their car to work and greeting co-workers as they enter the office. What can companies do to connect with employees in this environment?
True Colors: Clearing the Way for a New Culture
Building a culture of teamwork across the company can be a powerful mobilizing vision. But what if not everyone wants to play ball? This can be particularly challenging in a partnership, where each member acts as a distinct profit center and may not be eager to break out of their silo and support the cohesive ideal. So, how to move forward?
Developing Your Emerging Leaders
By Megan Patton
Principal and People Practice Leader
Many of our clients find themselves in this challenging situation: they have grown their company, they are an active president or CEO, but they are still doing much of the day-to-day work. They are essentially glorified managers, not true leaders of their organizations. If they have multiple supervisor-level people reporting to them, they aren’t able to work in a strategically effective manner. Instead, they spend much of their time directing and managing the levels beneath them.
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).