CEO Think: Blog
Tinkering with Strategy Can Derail Midsize Companies
Too much innovation at the top of a midsized company can kill growth.
READ MORE >Midsize Companies Must Prioritize Ruthlessly
The world is littered with the hollowed-out shells of firms that tried to do too much and spent too big trying to grow too fast. Many of those firms were midsize companies; they didn’t have the resources of the big firms to sustain setbacks, nor were they scrappy like most small companies, making do with the resources they had.
Common Sized Financials
Taking your balance sheet and income statements for the past four years (or for any past set of periods) and putting them in common size format is a fast track to analyzing changes in your financial conditions. There is just no way you can look at standard financial statements and see the same thing as quickly.
How to Advertise to Attract the Best Candidates
I use “Snazzy Job Descriptions” when it is hard to find and attract ideal candidates for a position. It has only one goal: To get ideal candidates to contact the company.
How To Find The Millennials Who Will Lead Your Company
How do you begin to find Millennials who are prepared to join into your company with the proper skills to carry your company on into the future?
Why the Best Midsized Companies Balance Business Meetings with Social Meetings
I’m a big advocate of structured meetings, but some teams can feel choked by too much facilitation—as though they can’t talk informally, like they used to.
What CEOs Of The Fastest-Growing Midsized Companies Worry About (Hint: It’s Not Their Markets)
Kiss growth goodbye without processes. Truth be told, I get emotionally upset every time I see a firm with promising growth blow it due to poor processes.
A Recipe For a Persuasive Book Review
Book reviews typically evaluate recently-written works. They offer a brief description of the text’s key points and often provide a short appraisal of the strengths and weaknesses of the work.
Satisfaction Destroys High Performance
I saw a post titled, “Forget Setting Goals. Focus on This Instead” and I couldn’t stop myself from writing a short piece in support of goal setting…
How A Volatile World Raises The Leadership Ante For Midsized Companies
Lately it seems like just when a company has a winning strategy figured out, things change, and back to the drawing board they must go. This won’t change anytime soon: we are in a volatile world.
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).