There’s certain stuff I really hate. To see if other CEOs hate what I hate, I conducted a survey. Turns out we hate the same stuff, though to different degrees.
So I thought I’d share the results. I hope CEOs will find them interesting. But my real goal is to share insights with people who work for CEOs. The better you understand what CEOs hate, the more likely you’ll avoid saying and doing things that will push their “really hate” button, which could be “really bad” for your career.
Just to clarify, we’re not talking hate as in “hate crimes.” Most respondents understood this, though one admonished me, suggesting I might have substituted “find foolish.” But that doesn’t have the same ring, does it?
Okay, here’s my list:
Hateful Thing #7: “People who conclude I'm greedy without understanding the risks I take.” Only 19% of CEOs surveyed said they “really hate” this or that it “makes my blood boil.” Most CEOs said they found it “just annoying” that people resent them for the fact they profit from the business more than anyone else. I admire CEOs who take the high-road on this one. I took the low road and gave this a “really hate” score. When I was younger, I was deeply idealistic, had no understanding of risk, and thought most business people were greedy bastards, which perhaps explains why today I am a little bit intolerant of people who are – ahem – exactly like I used to be.
Hateful Thing #6: “People who tell me how to run my business when they don't understand my business.” Only 26% gave this at least a “really hate” score. About half found it “just annoying.” I gave it a “really hate” score initially but I’m downgrading to “just annoying” because it’s usually a harmless mistake. But I have a strong caution for job interviewees. Don’t ever, ever talk to a CEO as if you understand a business you don’t understand. The CEO won’t hate you for it. But I guarantee you won’t get hired. Nothing labels you as an amateur more than making assumptions about a business you don’t know. I once had a marketing candidate tell me, “What you really need to do is segment your list.” Duh! Come to think of it, that was more than “just annoying.”
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Hateful Thing #5: “People who think I got where I am through luck or favoritism rather than hard work.” This rose to “really hate” status for only a third of respondents, but I’m with the minority on this one. Maybe it’s because in 2002 my partner and I – feeling lucky, privileged and full of hope – started a traditional print publishing business. By 2008, like most traditional media companies, it was on terminal life support. Just in time for the Great Recession. An earthquake followed by a tsunami. But somehow we survived. Don’t talk to us about luck or favoritism.
Hateful Thing #4: “Senior executives who recommend a strategy but have no data or evidence to support it.” Nearly four in 10 “really hate” this one. For me, it’s just annoying. Fact is, I’m better at telling other people to support their ideas than I am at supporting my own. A year after we launched in 2002 I created a successful division within our business where I researched every move I made. But in 2008, when we morphed our dying publishing business into a web-based learning company, it was all gut. We were desperate, did minimal research, and bet the farm on a hunch. Smartest move we ever made. Go figure.
Hateful Thing #3: “Employees who have a strong sense of entitlement.” Forty-five percent scored this “really hate” or “makes my blood boil.” I worked for an entrepreneur in the 1990s who really hated entitlement and he created a culture that minimized it. He taught me how to interview job candidates, and I remember he never missed an opportunity to say, “We’re a meritocracy, and the one thing our culture won’t tolerate is a sense of entitlement.” I remember him asking people if they understood what that meant and listening very carefully to their answers. We effectively screened out people who felt entitled. If you run a union shop, there’s only so much you can do. But in non-union companies, you can curtail entitlement with effective recruiting and onboarding.
Hateful Thing #2: “People who suddenly proclaim, after an effort failed, that they were against it all along.” This is a bad quality for a rank-and-file employee. But it’s absolutely poisonous in a high-level executive. Which is why nearly 50% of respondents gave this at least a “really hate” and it had the highest “makes my blood boil” score. You want key players on your team who are bold, who express their ideas forcefully, and who embrace accountability. “I knew this would fail” is often mere cowardice – the person fears taking risky positions and avoids doing so in a calculated way. But it could also be evidence of a weak will and a victim complex when “I was against it all along” is punctuated by “Nobody ever listens to me.” Don’t know about you, but I don’t want anyone in a key executive role that nobody listens to.
Hateful Thing #1: “Key employees who withhold information because they think it will upset me.” This was the winner by a mile. Sixty three percent gave this at least a “really hate” and 26% said it made their blood boil. I think this speaks to the vulnerability that CEOs feel acutely and that the people below them often don’t understand. CEOs are vulnerable because they rely so heavily on others. The bigger the company, the more powerful a CEO is, the more this is true. Strategic business decisions are always made with incomplete information. But nothing is scarier to a CEO than the thought of making such a decision lacking information that somebody had but failed to disclose. Troubling thought: If this is a big problem for us, we need to ask ourselves tough questions such as, “Is there something about the way I react to the truth that makes people afraid to tell me?” or “Have I failed to create a culture of transparency where people can dialogue freely and candidly about uncomfortable issues?”
So there you have it, a “What CEOs hate” list that should translate into a pretty good “Don’t do” list for the people who report to them.
