Dream On, Strategically

The other day, I was sitting in my office and made myself a cup of coffee. It's a daily ritual for me, one that I really enjoy—fresh coffee percolating through the machine, the aroma filling the office. I had an appointment in a couple of hours, so I was dressed for that. I very gingerly picked up my cup of coffee and sat down. As I leaned forward to take my first sip, I held the cup away from me so that nothing would spill on my white shirt. The next day while sitting at home enjoying a cup of coffee, I realized that I hadn't gone to any of the extra pains that I had taken the previous day in drinking my coffee. I just sat there in my home clothes, not really concerned whether or not I spilled anything on myself—I just enjoyed the coffee!

As I reflected on these two scenarios, I realized that intent was at the very center—to be very careful on the one hand, and not being bothered by it on the other hand. Without intent to be careful or to do something, we are very much like people without a rudder. We just let the wind take us where we want; it really doesn't matter. Yet, life is not lived that way. Life is lived with intentionality—taking the oars in our hand and steering our course, not letting ourselves be carried around by the vagaries of wind or weather.

On Being A Competent CEO

Novo pen is a pen that I use and I use it a couple of times a day. It has more value for me than all the other pens that I have around me. I pleasantly surprised to read that Lars Sorensen, the CEO of Novo Nordisk, was voted the best performing CEO by Harvard Business Review for the year 2015. That was good to read and to know that Lars Sorensen, among the myriad number of CEOs all across the world and in different companies, had been picked as #1.

But as I looked at that, and thought about CEOs and the roles that they play in organizations, I wanted to do a little bit of research and see the extent of CEOs' impact on companies. It's interesting that the impact that CEOs have on companies ranges from 2% to 22% depending on the industry. This was research that was done and recorded by Todd Warner in Harvard Business Review. It seems like just 10 or 15 years ago, competencies that CEOs had were very important in determining the kind of jobs that they were given and the kind of impact that they had on their companies.

Dream On - Strategically

The other day I was sitting in my office and made myself a cup of coffee. It's a daily ritual for me, one that I really enjoy—fresh coffee, percolating through the machine, the aroma filling the office… J I had an appointment in a couple of hours and so I was dressed for that. I very gingerly picked up my cup of coffee and sat down, putting the cup carefully down on the table. As I leaned forward to take my first sip, I held the cup away from me so that nothing would spill on my white shirt. The next day while sitting at home enjoying a cup of coffee, I realized that I hadn't gone to any of the extra pains that I had taken the previous day in drinking my coffee. I just sat there in my home clothes, not really concerned whether I spilled anything on myself or not – I just enjoyed the coffee!

As I reflected on these two scenarios, I realized that "intent" was at the very centre – to be very careful on the one hand, and a lack of it on the other. On the one hand, clearly wanting to make sure that nothing spilled because I was going into a meeting, and on the other hand, not bothered at all, just a 'qué será, será' kind of attitude.  Without intent to be careful or to do something, we are very much like people without a rudder. We just let the wind take us where we want; it really doesn't matter. Yet, life is not lived that way. Life is lived with intentionality -- taking the oars in our hand and steering our course, not letting ourselves be carried around by the vagaries of wind or weather.

Your Defining Moment

Roberto Goizueta took over as CEO of Coca-Cola in the 1980s, a time of huge competition between Pepsi and Coke. Executives from Coke were trying to increase their market share by just 0.1% to be able to say that they were ahead of Pepsi. Roberto decided to do something different. He called a meeting of all his executives. In that meeting he said, "Tell me, what's the average fluid intake of an American per day?" The answer: "Fourteen ounces." Next question: "What is Coke's share of that?" They answered, "Two ounces." Then Roberto said, "That's our answer. We're not going after Pepsi, we're going after the other 12 ounces. Our competition is water, tea, coffee, milk and fruit juices that Americans consume in the remaining 12 ounces." Coke never looked back after that, putting up vending machines at every street corner, making their products easily available, and won that particular battle hands down.

There are times in our lives when defining moments are called for. As somebody said, "There's a defining moment in every person's life. Within that moment, everything that that person is, shines its brightest." And for Roberto, this was the defining moment. A defining moment is one that is not just taken by an extrovert or somebody who is outgoing. It's a moment in time, whether you are an extrovert or an introvert, rational or intuitive, whatever your personality type is, when you feel that there's something that has to come out of you, that needs to be said, and which will make a difference. That's a defining moment. It defines the situation, defines the people; it defines who you are in terms of leadership.

STRATEGIC INTENT

by Dr. Cecil Clements (23rd October 2012)


I was thinking about how to bring about the whole topic of intent, about being very clear about what we needed to do and having the intent to do it. The other day I was sitting in my office, made myself a cup of coffee, carefully carried it and sat down gingerly, making sure that the cup was held away from me, as I got comfortable. Then I leaned forward, taking all these pains because I didn’t want to spill the coffee on my clothes. The next morning I was sitting at home, having another cup of coffee, lounging in home clothes, this time quite unperturbed about dropping any coffee on myself.