The Ten Roads to Riches – The Ways the Wealthy Got There (and How You Can Too!) Summary - Road 2

Road #2: Becoming a CEO

1.       Be warned:

a.      It is heavy.

b.      Success has a thousand fathers, but failure is a bastard. People tend to blame CEO for everything.  This is the risk you take – but it is well-paid career risk.

2.      What it takes?

a.      You need leadership and executive qualities to rise, be anointed, and keep the throne.

b.      Again, most important CEO trait is leadership.

c.       Read a lot. Books about management and business. Study companies.

Guidelines:

3.      Enjoy what you do.

a.      It usually requires a long career before landing on a CEO career. It is easier to put in the years if you have a passion for what you do and love.

b.      The more profitable the field, the better.

4.      Start at small firm.

a.      Aim small – less likely to screw up in ways preventing you from getting the next CEO job at a bigger firm.

b.      Else, just do a great job and grow from tiny to huge.

5.      Get the job.

a.      Method #1: Ride-along.

                                                  i.      Rise-through-the-ranks method is tried, true, and profitable.

b.      Method #2: Buy it.

                                                  i.      Do a one-man private equity transaction and buy a firm you like, with own money or OPM. (Example: Warren Buffett)

c.       Method #3: Be the go-to.

                                                  i.      If you are in a VC, consulting, or private equity firm, you cam get tapped to step in to lead a troubled portfolio company.

d.      Method #4: Get recruited.

                                                  i.      Take acting classes. Acting helps you make a great first impression and bowl someone over briefly.

                                                ii.      Practice interviewing. It is more about interviewing skill and the appearance of management skill than real leadership skills. Package your resume well!

                                              iii.      Study, wine and dine recruiters.

                                              iv.      Once you get a job, start selling yourself for the nest, bigger one.

e.      Smart CEOs negotiate great terms and their potential exist package – up front.

f.        Top pay doesn’t always link to which firms did best. If often reflects who had great career prospects and could have been CEO at any of many firms, but took a huge career risk to live for a few years in head-on-chopping-block status – betting his career on what happens in a short time frame.

g.      Remember to trade off base compensation for big upside.

6.      Be a hero!

a.      Being a hero is a good path to the CEO chair.

b.      Key to becoming hero-CEO: you must make your employees adore you while also being seen as a tough SOB.

c.       You must be fair and even-handed, though heavy handed when needed – but always without a hot temper.

d.      Be a swashbuckling risk taker. The one with vision, fearlessness to pursue it, and fortitude to recognize mistakes, alter course, and plunge fearlessly and again.

e.      Go for a lean, mean machine, a model of superior management, such as decentralized decision making, axed executive perks, very few management layers, and focus on innovation.

7.      Lead. Just do it!

a.      The key to leadership is showing up and doing it.

b.      Make a point to be the first there every day, and the least to leave.

c.       Take employees to lunch every day and dinner every night.

d.      Take care of your employees. Talk, spend time, and travel with them. Talk to your employees and make them feel you’re putting them first. That you care make them care – a basic truism of management and leadership.

e.      Make them know you care. It is all about how you get it in your employees’ bones that you care – about them, the firm, the customers, and the outcome.

8.      Lead from the front.

a.      Lesson from Julius Caesar – His troops knew he wasn’t asking them to take a risk he wouldn’t take himself, so they were more confident, fought harder and won always. Your employees will respect, follow, and love you more if you lead the charge, every time.

b.      Go with sales folks to see their customers or even vendors.

c.       Stay in the same dingy hotels on the road they do.

d.      Focus on your people. Skip the perks that may bug your people.

e.      If you don’t put yourself above them, they will put you above them in their hearts, which is where it matters.

f.        They need to believe you aren’t just in for the bucks. You need to make them believe. The best way to make them believe is to believe yourself. The more time you put into people, the more fun it becomes.

9.      Spend time with your lowest employees and your smallest clients.

a.      Keep leading from the front even you’re Big Time.

b.      It is more important to be comfy with your lowest-level employees and smallest customers than in the boardroom. It breeds trust and loyalty and keeps you connected with your firm’s culture.

c.       Basic rule: Every CEO, every month, must spend time with normal bread-and-butter customers and bottom-of-the-org-structure employees.

d.      You need support from underneath when things got tough.

Road #3: Becoming a Ride-Along