
The Sad Truth About Developing Executives - tandavas
http://recode.net/2015/03/11/the-sad-truth-about-developing-executives/
======
beloch
"You should be extremely clear up front that you expect your executives to be
world-class in their functions. If they are not, they will not keep their
jobs. Furthermore, you will not be able to make them world-class, because you
are not world-class in their areas."

I see two big problems with this statement:

1\. It falls into the "everyone must be extraordinarily excellent" trap. The
average employee is... average. Odds are your hiring practices are average
too. It is better to focus on getting people's best than it is to focus on
having the best people, because very few companies actually do have the best
people. If you think your company is different, you had better have a
compelling reason.

2\. Even for good employees, it takes time for them to adapt to your company
and perform at their best. Obviously you need to let some people go, but if
you hold a noose over their heads from day one they're just going to worry
about looking good for long enough to collect their options/bonuses/etc..
Looking good in the short-term and doing good in the long-term are often
incompatible goals.

~~~
hacknat
1\. Nah, I think he's right. You're right in that most start-ups will never
run into the issues that he's talking about, because most will fail, but if
you need to take sales national or international then your VP of Sales better
be either a domain leader or know a helluvalot more than you. Either way, you
have to trust executives at a level that you never have to for average
employees.

2\. I didn't see him say anywhere that performance has to be measured short-
term. Having a noose over your head based on long term results is very
possible. Of course you evaluate your executives on their last major completed
project/action, it may have taken 6-18 months (or longer) for it to come to
fruition, but that doesn't mean a noose isn't over their heads.

~~~
notahacker
Your VP of Sales will know a helluva lot more than you do if they're _remotely
competent_ at their job though, which is not by any stretch of the imagination
equivalent to being "world class". Any decent VP of Sales will also be highly
adept at shifting blame if you make it clear the knife is hanging over their
head from the start...

Even in sales, which has an unusually straightforward success metric, beyond a
certain threshold of above-average competency the leadership is more about how
well their approach gels with the most suitable approach for your service, and
how flexible they are in their approaches than whether they're some mythical
10x unicorn. Someone who is "world class" at scaling inside sales teams is not
going to be "world class" at figuring out how to get your small team of domain
experts to network their way to niche domination... if anything applying
lessons learned from their experience might make things worse. And I'm not
sure what even makes a Head of HR "world class", but I'd certainly prefer a
shared philosophy than a stellar set of resume accomplishments.

Anyone involved in a sufficiently large organization who thinks all their
senior executives are "world class" or necessary to eliminate is clearly the
weak link on the team, especially when it comes to judging others' abilities.

------
varunjuice
When you're hired as an executive, the state of affairs is either glorious or
shit.

If its glorious, its because the previous executive left. You in this case
have the excellent opportunity of not screwing it up. Good luck, but it'll be
while before anyone figures out that you're an imposter. Typically, your team
will know well ahead of the CEO. By the time the CEO knows, its too late to
mentor you. The damage is done.

If the state of affairs is terrible when you join, as a semi reasonable
executive, you should be able to identify the most basic things that are effed
up, and show improvement within 90 days. If you're unable to improve things
right away, when they are screwed up -- sorry, you don't have what it takes.
No amount of mentorship will address this.

~~~
floppydisk
Wisest words I ever got early in my career from a boss who spent a couple of
decades in senior management at a variety of big and small tech companies was
if you're hired as an executive you immediately do three things. 1) Get in
early, leave late, and read everything about the group you're running. 2) Get
to know your people and understand the problems you're dealing with. 3) Change
nothing immediately. Waltzing in and changing things willy nilly is a recipe
for disaster. I'd counter and say within 90 days you should have a handle on
the group you're running, what's going really well, what's going poorly, and
identify plan(s) to address major areas that need addressing. It shows you
actually understand and aren't simply kicking the apple cart for the sake of
making an impression.

~~~
varunjuice
Fair point. When I say 90 days, I think if things are bad, it's typically easy
to spot where the degenerate behaviors are starting, and correcting them. In
90 days, the leading indicators need to start looking good. It takes time for
that to flow through the system.

------
bsder
This article is foolishly binary. People are either world-class or are poor
performers.

Your people are at least nominally competent. They got you to this point,
after all.

So, all of his points about people already inside the organization are much
more easily summarized as "If someone inside your organization is performing
poorly, you don't have the time to do anything but fire them." I probably
agree with this not because I think that your startup magically needs to move
so fast, but because most managers are far too unwilling to fire people that
desperately need to be fired.

As for an external executive hire, the whole point of pulling them in is to
add a needed skillset to the mix. If they don't actually have the skill you
needed, _why did you hire them in the first place_.

As for long term, this article falls into the trap of assuming that management
is somehow an inherent talent. It is not--it is a learned behavior. This is a
huge problem in business since people who believe that managerial skill is
inherent _never strive to measure or improve their skill_.

~~~
dietrichepp
Did you read the same article I did? The point was not that people are binary,
but that success in executive positions is more binary than it is in other
positions, because of the weight of early impressions on respect, the weight
of respect on job performance, and the high impact of executives on the
organization. You can hire an incompetent fry cook, engineer, or salesperson
and train them to do their job (within reason).

~~~
bsder
There are _TWO_ classes of executives. The first class are the people who are
already at your company. The second class are the people who are brought in
from outside.

While the advice in this article _might_ hold for the parachuters from
outside, it most definitely does _NOT_ hold for those already at your company.
Following this advice is a good way to paralyze a functioning company.

------
angersock
Unfortunately, especially in a startup, there aren't many friendly ways of
saying "Hey, CEO, I think you're sucking at leading and sales. What gives?"

Especially if you're an early employee and not in the elevated founder class.

~~~
harryh
Sure there is. You go talk to the CEO and say "I think you're sucking at
leading and sales. And I think that because of reasons X, Y & Z."

They might not listen to you but you can certainly tell them.

~~~
nostrademons
Better is "Why aren't we doing X, Y, and Z to improve sales?" That phrases it
in a positive tone, with concrete solutions, and gives the CEO an opportunity
to tactfully tell you why your model of the world may be wrong.

Beware that very often the response is "Well, I never considered that, but it
sounds like a good idea. Why don't you lead a project to do X, Y, and Z and
we'll see how it turns out? Oh, and be sure to get your regular work done
too."

~~~
lotsofmangos
Better still...

 _Remember that idea you suggested last week in the pub of doing X Y and Z.
Well, we started doing it on the side and it is increasing sales. Should we
start doing it officially?_

------
mpdehaan2
I think it's also missing the obvious, "they don't know what they are doing
when they are playing in other orgs". It's sort of implied that helping
someone is something the CEO doesn't have time for, but it's a little unclear
that they might not need the help, and their job is to just coordinate, make
sure to hire the right execs, and remove friction (+ raise funds).

Some of the best advice I ever got (not for exec things) was "just be sure
everybody thinks you're helping, no matter what they do".

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UK-AL
Problem is that the skillset to be CEO, and to be employee are different. The
employee probably knows more about that area than a CEO, that's why you hired
him.

Which why its so difficult to get on the path to be a ceo. The only way to
really learn to be a CEO, is to be a CEO. And to get that chance you have to
take risks, like founding.

~~~
simonswords82
Totally agree.

When I founded my software company 9 years ago I was 23 and to say I was wet
behind the ears is an understatement. I didn't have the faintest idea about
leaders versus managers, strategy, operations, procedure, policy, management
of staff, performance management...the list goes on. I thought that these were
all just bullshit words that people used to cover up the fact that they were
sit at their jobs.

Nearly 10 years of trial and error and I'm now capable of operating as a CEO
at board level. My management team are crazy good at what they do, so I'd like
to think they wouldn't have stuck around if I wasn't any good!

What I'm bad at is ops and managing people but that's fine. I've learned the
hard way that this isn't my forte and hired somebody better than me at that to
do that job. Hiring better people than you is an old adage but so true.

There is a downside to being a founder and CEO. It makes you more or less
unemployable in a typical employer/employee relationship.

------
jkw
Andreessen Horowitz has stated they like to develop founders into CEOs, rather
than replace them with a professional CEO. If a founder CEO needs development,
is no leniency for another exec to develop? What about co-founder non-CEO
execs? Does this apply to them as well?

~~~
PakG1
CEOs brought in from the outside are free agents. Founder CEOs (especially
first-time founder CEOs) are draft picks. You don't bring in a free agent in
order to develop them, unless they're a reclamation project, you were able to
get them cheap, and you have a hole in your team that you really can't fill a
better way. Rather, you bring in the free agent to elevate your team
immediately and give you a shot at a championship trophy.

------
bhewes
There are fast track executive development programs in Oil and Gas. But, the
point is to develop a person before they become an executive. That said the
mental shift from building to executing a company is difficult.

------
dgomez1092
What about the mantra: "surround yourself by people smarter than you". Where
is the source of incompetence, is it actually lack of intellectual brainpower
or is it contextual?

------
sgt101
All of these things are true if your expectation of the future has zero value.

On the other hand, if you think that there is any future then non of these
things is true.

~~~
nostrademons
His point is that while you're waiting for the future, all of the people who
report up to that executive have lost confidence in him. That confidence is
impossible to regain. In the process, you will lose your best individual
contributors and your best first-level managers.

Think of it from the perspective of a talented, savvy engineer at the company.
If your CEO hires a bozo to manage engineering, do you stick around? Why
should you? You are very good at what you do; you have plenty of options
elsewhere, friends at other companies that are continually asking "Why don't
you come work for Floogle?", and recruiters from Flare that are battering down
your LinkedIn account. You're already aware that your VP makes a lot more
money than you do; if it's clear that you are way more competent than he is,
why should you stay?

Ben's guiding philosophy of management is "Always view all of your decisions
from the perspective of everyone in the company." Trying to develop an
executive for future potential may be what the CEO wants, it certainly is what
the executive wants - but it's not fair to the individual contributors who
work under that executive.

~~~
cauterized
Why is it that binary, though? Surely somewhere between "incompetent" and
"world-class" there's space for execs who are "good enough to earn their
reports' respect but with room to grow in a few areas"?

~~~
nostrademons
It's not binary, from an objective perspective. The thing is, if you even
_think_ that his advice might apply to your situation, _the exec in question
has lost your respect_. That means that they lost their reports' respect
several months ago (the CEO is always the last to know), and you have a major
problem on your hands.

~~~
cauterized
I don't know about that. It'd be really easy for a credulous person to read
that article and think "oh, some of my execs aren't world class yet. Guess I'd
better replace them."

Yeah, once you've lost the respect of your reports (or failed to ever gain it)
you can't do your job as a manager or executive, period. But that doesn't mean
that great execs are born rather than made or that nobody should put any
effort into developing a great manager into a new exec or a new exec into a
great one, which the article seems to fallaciously suggest.

------
acjohnson55
So much sympathy here for the poor mid level executive. I don't think it's
unreasonable to have unyielding expectations of the people you're presumably
compensating an order of magnitude above the rank and file. They'd best be
world class at _something_ , otherwise how the hell have they made it to the
C-suite?

------
gaius
He thinks the right equity stake for a great engineer is 0.2%. Huh.

~~~
philsnow
That number is anywhere from laughable to totally reasonable to overly
generous, depending on several things including size of the company.

If you're giving employee #1 0.2%, maybe you should be hiring a contractor or
something.

If you're Google, you're not going to give an engineer 0.2% even if he's The
Best One.

------
Hansenq
"In the end, a CEO has got to know her limitations."

I love how he switches between gendered pronouns in this article, and ends
with a female one.

~~~
thirsteh
Really, a complaint about somebody going through the effort of avoiding these
complaints?

~~~
joecasson
I don't think they were being tongue-in-cheek.

------
michaelochurch
This is the "I don't know how to do it, so no one does" fallacy. Total
bullshit.

See, I'm pretty confident that, in a focused year of mentoring, I could turn
anyone with strong general intelligence (say, IQ over 125) into a good
programmer. If I can train someone into a hard job, then it can't be that
difficult to train someone into a much easier job.

 _You should be extremely clear up front that you expect your executives to be
world-class in their functions. If they are not, they will not keep their
jobs._

Oh, this is just self-congratulatory claptrap. I don't consider myself a
"world-class" programmer. I'm good, but it's not like I'm not one of the 20
best out there. And I'm far more "world-class" than 99 percent of tech
executives.

