Would You Want This Guy as Your Boss?

A major public corporation was in need of a new CEO. One candidate was a young executive who had been with the company less than 2 years and had never before served as chief executive of any company. However, the search committee and the Board of Directors found him quite charismatic and full of potential. He had excellent rapport with employees, too. The young exec wooed the Board with ideas for increasing employee morale and productivity, boosting sales, and making the firm a true industry leader. This was music to the ears of the Board as their corporation had recently experienced financial trouble and was seen by some in the public and press as out-dated and uncaring toward employees and other stakeholders.

The young exec was eventually appointed CEO and expectations from all quarters were high. The Board hoped that soon their stock price would rise and the company's image would improve as the energetic and eloquent CEO set out to promote the corporation. At a "town hall" meeting with employees, the new CEO stated his vision for the company but offered few details about what strategies would be implemented. He then told the workers that the company was making products that were of questionable quality and safety and that some employees were making too much money.

Next, at the CEO's first major appearance, at an industry conference, he used most of his speech to highlight what he considered the past mistakes of the company. He apologized for these and even indicated that his enterprise had too much market share. Then, rather than note some of the soon-to-launch products of the company, the CEO talked vaguely about products that had so far proven unpopular and unprofitable.

A while later, the CEO announced that the company would be acquiring several businesses in various industries completely unrelated to the corporation's core products. Moreover, these would be hostile takeovers, the existing managers at these firms would be fired, and the CEO and his deputies would take over strategic decision-making for them. This latest move was unnerving to investors because the CEO knew nothing about these new businesses.

Then, the CEO sent out a memo that some managers would be docked pay and denied promotions because the he simply didn't like the opinions they offered on a special task force under the old CEO.

At this point, if you were on the Board of this company, wouldn't you want to know what the hell the CEO was doing? Wouldn't you question what the CEO actually liked about the corporation and why he really wanted to be its leader? If you were an employee or manager, would you want this guy as your boss?

Mull this over and come back in a day or so for the rest of the story.