Happy 4th and sorry for the delay in posting this week. A surgical procedure seemed to take over my life for a few days.

I want to share the thoughts of a CEO, one of my former clients of a multi-billion dollar financial institution, Mr. Peter Mattoon.  Early next week, if not before, I will comment on all the activity that last week’s post generated. Thank you for for your thoughtfulness.

CEO Mattoon writes:

I agree with your persistence comment but I actually think everyone misses to target.

My view is that things always go wrong, small and large and the only way to solve for that inevitability to have the right strategy, the right people in the right seats, and ensure each of those person’s knows their role in the process of meeting executing the strategy. Building blocks/interdependence/team culture… whatever you want to call it.

So one, the CEO needs to know the market and the firm’s distinctive competencies vs competitors and how to make that differentiation clear to their target market, aka, buyers.

That same CEO must then be able to attract and retain the people who implement the core components of that strategy.

In this case, it is hard to imagine that a person (Oher’s editorial comment) can consistently attract and retain superior people unless they are all mercenaries (think financial services!!). So the CEO must have some semblance of interpersonal capabilities.

Additionally, I am not great at execution or much of a detail guy. I know this and consequently hired people who “make me whole”; Joe, my COO for example.

Also, the CEO must be able to drive the revenue line. This is not mentioned in the blog.

Last, leading by example is always valued. That is on my mind all the time.

Thoughts?