Issue No. 507 of Your Weekly Staff Meeting highlights the tenth book I’ve reviewed by Ram Charan, the esteemed business consultant, author, and CEO adviser. He warns “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it,” is terrible advice! And this reminder: click here to download free resources from the 20 management buckets (core competencies), click here for over 500 book reviews, and click here my review of Fit at Last, by Ken Blanchard.
Worst Advice Ever: “If It Ain’t Broke, Don’t Fix It”
Pssst! Here’s a little secret. Please keep it quiet.
When reading a new book, I’ll often scan the chapter titles and pick one chapter to read first. If it’s satisfying, enlightening, or inspiring—I’ll keep going. If not, I’ll close the book and move on. I only review and recommend books I’ve read thoroughly for Your Weekly Staff Meeting. Unlike other critics, I won’t waste my time and your time on a book that isn’t helpful. (Click here to read why one book guru gives a book only 50 pages to rope him in.)
So…for this issue’s book, I started with Chapter 6, “Rethinking the Myth ‘If It Ain’t Broke, Don’t Fix It.'” Bingo! It sucked me in—and I devoured the entire book. Every CEO and board member (including nonprofit leaders) will find fresh insights in Talent: The Market Cap Multiplier, by Ram Charan and Anish Batlaw (168 pages, Jan. 25, 2022).
Ram Charan’s commentary in Chapter 6 cautions that “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it,” is faulty thinking. “This has been the worst wisdom for centuries.” In one of six “real-world case studies” featured in Talent, co-author Anish Batlaw describes his work with Hemnet, Sweden’s dominant online site for real estate listings. Was the current CEO (they called him “John”) capable of growing the company? Was “John” a growth-oriented CEO?
Ram Charan notes that Hemnet was not “broken” when General Atlantic invested in it, “so many might have said it needed no repairs. This would have been an error. It faced some great opportunities, but, to seize them, it needed some fixes.”
Yikes! Imagine…if your organization had a “90 percent market share and about 88 percent awareness among consumers,” and had “an implicit value of $214 million.” “John” is doing a great job, right? If it ain’t broke…
NOPE! (Or as they say in Sweden, NEF!). General Atlantic, with a 61 percent stake, believed a new growth-oriented CEO could rocket Hemnet to new levels. So…the Hemnet board said adjö (goodbye) to “John” and, with the help of the lead deal partner at General Atlantic, they recruited a growth-oriented CEO—in less than 100 days!
Not easy! Ram Charan comments, The lead deal partner “sensed that something was not right, and he had the conviction to trust his instinct and engage Anish [co-author of Talent]. He trusted the data that Anish presented to him and eventually made the tough decision to agree to replace the CEO. This took incredible courage, as he had to go back to the Investment Committee just after completing the deal and tell them the company needed a new CEO.”
He adds, “You have to make tough decisions at times. Too often, leaders hang on to talent for too long because they are loyal or have performed well in the past. The loyalty needs to be to the business. The company comes first.”
That’s my favorite chapter, but the other short chapters all tie for second place! (Did I mention my Swedish heritage?) Here’s why you’ll devour and quote from this book in future staff and board meetings:
THE TALENT PLAYBOOK. The introduction paints a new vision for the Chief HR Officer’s role—with a nod to COVID—and “reinvents the C-suite operating manual.” Anish Batlaw’s approach “parts way with old practices, gut instinct, and speculation, and drills down into operational reality…”
Why the focus on talent? The authors document how, with the right talent, organizations can speed past sleepy, incremental growth and experience 2X, 3X, 5X and greater growth (over two to five years or so)—with the right talent. But this warning: there will be “bumps” and “jolts” along the way.
Chapter 1: EVANGELIST FOR TALENT. Bill Ford, General Atlantic’s CEO, is quoted in Chapter 1 with this: “Before, we focused on having the right investment, the right price and deal structure. But we’ve learned talent is as important as all of those things.” The authors add, “By his own account, Bill has become something of an evangelist for talent…”
“True leaders,” believes Bill Ford, “don’t have irrational goals—they’re rational, even when they seem unattainable.” And this: “I think about succession all the time.”
Chapter 2: TALENT BANK. Anish Batlaw’s unique approach to building a “Talent Bank” will change your thinking about building your executive team. “A great CEO establishes high standards for the leadership team and builds the team in the context of not where the company is today, but where it will be in the future.”
The case study on Oak Street Health includes Batlaw’s six-point evaluation of Oak Street’s CEO which included: Track Record, Strategic Thinking, Learning Agility, Drive for Results, Team Leadership, and Interpersonal Influence. (Not a bad list!) Don’t skip Ram Charan’s comments about the “War for Talent” and why compensation was benchmarked against larger companies—where Oak Street would eventually be. The right talent enabled Oak Street Health to build "an outstanding patient experience with a 90 percent Net Promoter Score." Click here for more on NPS.
Chapter 3: PREPARING A CEO FOR HYPERGROWTH. I’ve mentioned my “Page 25 Standard” in previous reviews. Talent waits until Page 55 to deliver a fascinating three-column implementation chart on the UK fashion company, Depop: Phase 1: Planning, Phase 2: Workshop, and Phase 3: Adoption. Ram Charan’s commentary follows Anish Batlaw’s case study at the end of each chapter. Charan’s insights: “Fundamental to Anish’s approach is hiring talent ahead of the curve.” Plus, the benefits of moving quickly. Charan is no stranger to the talent topic. See his books below.
Chapter 4: NO WAY…WOULD YOU TAKE THIS JOB! “A Risk-taking Leader Lifts a Corporate Phoenix From the Ashes” is must-reading for board members. If your organization is struggling, why would a highly qualified CEO candidate risk saying yes to you? And…how do you inspire a search firm to begin a search without a compensation agreement? This case study on Vishal Retail, a chain of Indian hypermarkets is beyond fascinating—and instructive. (It took me back to my 2009 review of the equally fascinating book, Being Indian.)
THERE’S MUCH MORE. I’ve already highlighted Chapter 6 for you (“If It Ain’t Broke…), and you’ll find more gems in the remaining chapters:
• Chapter 5 - “To be successful at Johnson & Johnson, you have to be exceptional at strategy but at the same time, immerse yourself in detail and nail execution.”
• Chapter 7 – Four themes from General Atlantic’s deal makers on what makes an “A” CEO. Example: “Makes decisions with speed and conviction, but pauses for decisions that are ‘high impact and irreversible.’”
• Chapter 8 – Read about the key role that the CHRO played in “Building a Leadership Team for a Successful Merger.”
• Chapter 9 – Maybe the most important reason to read the authors’ conclusion is this: “…the War for Talent will only get more intense. Proven leaders with demonstrated records of high performance are going to be pursued as never before. It will be more difficult, and more expensive, to recruit and retain them.”
REMINDER: “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it,” has “been the worst wisdom for centuries.”
To order from Amazon, click on the title for Talent: The Market Cap Multiplier, by Ram Charan and Anish Batlaw. (And thanks to Fortier PR and IdeaPress Publishing for sending a review copy.)
YOUR WEEKLY STAFF MEETING QUESTIONS:
1) It takes courage for a CEO and/or a board to make gutsy talent decisions. In his book, Owning Up, Ram Charan asks, “Are we well prepared to name our next CEO?” He adds, “There is nothing more important for a CEO than having the right strategy and the right choice of goals, and for the board, the right strategy is second only to having the right CEO.” Question: Do we have the right strategy and right choice of goals?
2) In the chapter, “Vision Growth Must Equal Leader Growth,” in Lessons From the Nonprofit Boardroom, Dan Busby and I include a lesson from my early days as a very young camp director. The subtitle: “Caution! Vision-casting often backfires.” (Read the chapter online here.) Question: Do we have growth-oriented senior leaders? If not, what’s our next step?
Wisdom from the Board Bucket! Master the four phases of board recruitment: Cultivation, Recruitment, Orientation, and Engagement.
The 20 Buckets Countdown:
The Board Bucket (#14) Insights from Mastering the Management Buckets Workbook: Management Tools, Templates and Tips from John Pearson, with commentary by Jason Pearson (2nd Edition, 2018) - Order from Amazon.
The Board Bucket Core Competency: “We believe that board members must sense God’s call to serve on the board of directors. We invest time in cultivating, recruiting, orienting and engaging board members in their strategic role as stewards of our organization. The first step in organizational sustainability is to inspire board members to be highly committed and generous partners in ministry.”
Ram Charan has written 31 books and, so far, I’ve reviewed 10 of his insight-packed resources, including:
BOARD GOVERNANCE
• Owning Up: The 14 Questions Every Board Member Needs to Ask, by Ram Charan (read my review)
• Boards That Lead: When to Take Charge, When to Partner, and When to Stay Out of the Way, by Ram Charan, Dennis Carey and Michael Useem (read my review)
TALENT
• The Talent Masters: Why Smart Leaders Put People Before Numbers, by Bill Conaty and Ram Charan (read my review)
• Leaders at All Levels: Deepening Your Talent Pool to Solve the Succession Crisis, by Ram Charan (read my review)
PLANNING AND EXECUTION
• The Amazon Management System: The Ultimate Digital Business Engine That Creates Extraordinary Value for Both Customers and Shareholders, by Ram Charan and Julia Yang (read my review)
• Rethinking Competitive Advantage: New Rules for the Digital Age, by Ram Charan with Geri Willigan (read my review)
Note: If you’re a listener (not a reader), you’ll find many of Ram Charan’s audio books at Libro.fm.
The 20 management buckets are perfect content for the lifelong learning segment in your weekly staff meetings (you do have weekly staff meetings, right?). Visit the 20 buckets webpage here.
JASON PEARSON: UNEXPECTED CREATIVE. If you’re thinking “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it,” is still smart wisdom—what if you’re wrong? Contact Pearpod Media (Design, Digital, Marketing, Social).
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