Nov 6, 2015
Bill worked for a CEO who usually considered himself the smartest person in the room. He had extensive experience in the industry we were in and had paid his dues to work his way into the C-suite. He considered himself the smartest person in the room because every time someone presented a new idea, the CEO would say something like this, “That’s a great idea! But it would be better if you….” Sometimes he would say, “When I was at XYZ Company, we did something like that and here is what we found that worked.” There are an infinite number of variations of this exchange. My CEO couldn’t resist adding value, a variation on the need to win (last week’s article). Do you know someone who always tries to add value? What about you? Do you always try to add value? Then it's time to lead by following.