It was another one of those blazing afternoons.
I guess we were all used to the resplendence of all three seasons – hot, hotter, and blazing hot. But nobody complained. Hot had become a way of life. I and two other of my rather leisurely friends made our way to a coffee shop. The bright idea for the afternoon was to gulp down our parched throats some hot coffee, amidst the mist of aromatic shishas. Men don’t analyze too much, I guess. They just do what they got to do. Hot coffee on a hot day seemed like a perfectly harmonious thing to do.
The conversation flowed in confluence with the smoke waving through the room. Floating here and there, going nowhere. The aroma of exotic Turkish coffee mixing fluently with the mist emanating from the Shishas. Pretty much like a scene out of that old Bollywood movie ‘dam maro dam’ sans of course the lovely women floating around.
Anyways, you perhaps are starting to ponder where or when does the CEO enter in this scene. So before I lose the skeleton of that CEO in the mist of those aromatic shishas….J
Let me cut to the chase.
The free flowing conversation received a rather sharp incision when someone asked the poignant question - “I wonder which discipline has the bigger chance of making it to CEO – Sales or Finance?” This filled me with sadness as IT did not even find a mention in the question! Anyways I ignored my hurt emotions and jumped into the conversation by offering a firm view anchored fully on empirical evidence and facts – “I believe it’s the Finance field which dominates the corner office”. Of course all three of us had firm and fully informed opinions but no one really knew what the true facts were. So I offered to do some research…..
I picked up the top 50 brands of the World. First of all that list itself is quite interesting. You have in it the expected McDonalds, Coca Cola et al. However increasingly the Chinese brands are breaking in as well – ever heard of ICBC (Asia), the 11th most known brand in the World!
Then of course there are geek firms which feature prominently on the list – Apple, Google, IBM, HP, Oracle, SAP, BB – not bad for IT. It has made it to the crème de le crème. No doubt by weaving a .net over the stock market’s eyes, whilst its brokers sipped Java!
Anyways, next I started looking at the top honchos who head up these fine companies and observed the following:
Game, Set, Match MBA: These coveted three letters M.B.A; they still dominate the Top. That too only from premier institutes such as Harvard, Wharton. So if Nicholas Carr publishes another HBR article, this time titled “MBA does not matter”, ignore him as much as you did his first one
Back to School: CEO resume are peppered with academic glories. Quite a few of them have more than one degree and that too from Ivy League institutions. Yes, there are indeed a few, high profile ones who jumped college to pursue their passion and made it to the corner office. However that is exactly what they are – a few!
The equal opportunity movement! : The corner office is quite like the Sahara desert if you were looking for women. When I came to Louis Vuitton in the list, I thought maybe, just maybe. But alas, thou too Brutus? Of course Pepsi was the pleasant variant, for reasons more than one
A kaleidoscope of experience: These guys have a rich tapestry of experience. They have ‘been there and done it’ at a number of places, in different roles and across different disciplines. The path to the top has many curves and top honchos seem to embrace each curve with a passion
Putting in the Years: Contrary to popular belief, the majority of top honchos careers are not characterized by the shifting sands of frequent job changes. In and out of companies, weaving their magic wands? Not really. Most have toiled their way in and around the bylanes of the same organization, putting in the hours, then days, then years, gaining deep experience, earning deeper credibility, building a strong foundation of trust and then claiming their right to the corner office. Old is indeed gold - at least when it comes to the top jobs @ top brands
Game, Set, Match MBA: These coveted three letters M.B.A; they still dominate the Top. That too only from premier institutes such as Harvard, Wharton. So if Nicholas Carr publishes another HBR article, this time titled “MBA does not matter”, ignore him as much as you did his first one
Back to School: CEO resume are peppered with academic glories. Quite a few of them have more than one degree and that too from Ivy League institutions. Yes, there are indeed a few, high profile ones who jumped college to pursue their passion and made it to the corner office. However that is exactly what they are – a few!
The equal opportunity movement! : The corner office is quite like the Sahara desert if you were looking for women. When I came to Louis Vuitton in the list, I thought maybe, just maybe. But alas, thou too Brutus? Of course Pepsi was the pleasant variant, for reasons more than one
A kaleidoscope of experience: These guys have a rich tapestry of experience. They have ‘been there and done it’ at a number of places, in different roles and across different disciplines. The path to the top has many curves and top honchos seem to embrace each curve with a passion
Putting in the Years: Contrary to popular belief, the majority of top honchos careers are not characterized by the shifting sands of frequent job changes. In and out of companies, weaving their magic wands? Not really. Most have toiled their way in and around the bylanes of the same organization, putting in the hours, then days, then years, gaining deep experience, earning deeper credibility, building a strong foundation of trust and then claiming their right to the corner office. Old is indeed gold - at least when it comes to the top jobs @ top brands
Someone witty I met recently would say - “two turkeys don’t make an eagle, Neetan”. Perhaps a more diligent collation of empirical evidence across Fortune 500 companies may yield a different set of conclusions.
However for concluding a shisha powered, coffee triggered, light conversation amongst three deep friends, the above observations provide an adequate picture of the internals of our beloved CEO’s anatomy.
