CEO Skills

Even though you think you can. I know it’s not a great idea to tell your audience that they’re wrong. But in my experience of working with hundreds of SMB owners it’s true. We aren’t really working on our companies…

How healthy are you? Don’t Check Your Gut! Did you do a gut check about how you’re feeling to answer that question? If yes, your answer is probably wrong - or at least short sighted. You may feel great but…

You have 3 jobs after you close on a new acquisition. Do them in the right order.

They're All the Same - Except for the Differences. At the highest level every company needs to do the same things: Make something people want to buy. Find those people and sell to them. Support the making and the selling…

This video explains the definition of urgent vs important. Here's how to use this tool in ways that aren't obvious. The goal is to allow you to focus on more strategic and important work and less on the merely urgent.…

A presentation I made to Sagan Passport about the best metrics for a company.

A presentation to TRIBE about Output Thinking and the Three levels of Management. Knowing the different outputs managers at different levels must produce. Makes your company more productive and easier to scale.

Here's How to Fix it. Humans are great at making quick judgements. Discernment may be one of our superpowers as a species. We immediately come to conclusions about what's going on and what needs to happen next. We say people…

What's up with all the letters? I've been working with a few clients recently who are hiring their first assistant. It's hard for some people and I get why. I imagine it's kind of like having a butler or a…

Does that sound contradictory? Read on. A business owner writes "I would like to eliminate all job duties from my plate and have the business run itself." Many of us want that too. And often learning about systemization and Output…

Why war is a bad metaphor for business. Business has often been described as war, but I think that's a poor metaphor. For one thing the point is not to win, as I said in a recent twitter post. Photo…

Your vision is tied to outputs. Here's how. Your vision is literally what you see. Your vision for your company is what you see that's possible. What your company can do or become that it hasn't yet. How your company…

There's a huge difference between 98% and 100%. The first 90% of the job takes 90% of the time. The last 10% takes the other 90% of the time. But it's worse than a time suck. Here's why. The typical…

Peter & I discuss. -Why most small business owners never achieve TIME FREEDOM. -How to exit without selling your company-The 3 stages of company growth -What is “CEO Time”. -Getting work done through other people. -The most commons mistakes that…

A summary of the Output Thinking book in 3 sentences. For CEOs and other managers to help you scale your company faster, and manage better.

How to get away from the day to day routine. OK so you've been reading my posts (that's about half of you) and applying this stuff (that's probably half again). What's happened? You've developed systems. You've documented them - all…

Don't Measure the Wrong Things. Metrics are important - but they can be deceiving. If you measure the wrong things you can think you're making progress when you're not. There are many things to measure in a company and some…

Output Thinking to transform your business. My book is now available on amazon. I’m posting some video interviews my friend Jon Matzner did with me about the book. Besides being a great guy, Jon thinks about business systems as much…

Output Thinking is a better way to view your company and manage people better. In part 3 of this Q&A with Jon Matzner and the author of the book Output Thinking: Scale Faster, Manage Better, Transform Your Company we talk…

Output Thinking is a better way to view your company and manage people better. This is part 2 of Q&A with Jon Matzner and the author of the book Output Thinking: Scale Faster, Manage Better, Transform Your Company.

Output Thinking is a new way to view your company and manage people better. Part 1 of Q&A about the book Output Thinking: Scale Faster, Manage Better, Transform Your Company. Jon Matzner and the author talk about what Output Thinking…

Output Thinking is a new way to view your company and manage people better. This video is a short introduction to the book Output Thinking: Scale Faster, Manage Better, Transform Your Company.

It's why you hire people. PLUS a Big Announcement. My book, Output Thinking is now available for Pre-order Special. If you pre-order before Dec 5 and email a copy of the receipt to John@CEOBootCamp.com I'll send you a PDF copy…

You May Be Thinking About Time Wrong. When people think about time they usually think about what they're doing with their time. The best way to think about it is to think about why you're doing what you're doing. The…

It's an art not a science. The Science and The Art of Business. I write about systems in business. How you take an input, apply a transformation to it and produce an output. It's the outputs what make a company…

How to Describe Company Culture so it's Useful. I could have written him off as a poor cultural fit and let him go, but I knew if I could fix the issues, it would be better for the company.~David Dodson…

It's not really a monster. It's several monsters! Email overwhelm is one of the most common complaints I hear from clients. They find it hard to give away the work of answering emails despite the fact that email keeps them…

How to Remove Yourself from the day-to-day Routine. We've talked before that the point of a system is to produce an output. I want to expand that and say that systems make creating outputs repeatable and scalable. Repeatable means outputs…

Don't Forget the Sunscreen. It's the season when lots of people take vacations. So I thought I'd share a bit about how to do it when you're a business owner. Why? The first question (always – about almost anything) to…

One of My Clients is Moving Really Fast. People grow at their own pace. Usually the constraints are internal not external. As a coach I've developed some tools and techniques to help but I can't do it for anyone. But…

There are only seven reasons to spend money or have someone work in your company. It's the lens I see a company thru when I'm helping a client grow their company, make more money and have a better life. I…

If I told you, I'd be lying but it makes great click-bait! I'd be lying because you don't need systems. You need outputs. Systems are just the means to the end. We've talked before about the four parts of a…

Separate Before You Delegate. I'd be fine earning half as much money if I could get my time back. That's a common theme I hear from business owners. And the solution is NOT time management. A public 24 hour clock…

There's actually a way to tell. I’ve gotten a lot of subscribers since October 2022 so I’m reposting this because I think it’s important. Something I didn’t mention when I posted it first is that thinking in systems is a…

It Involves Elves! If the reason we hire people is to have them produce outputs, it makes sense that we understand what an output is. That's where the elves come in. Seriously. There's a child's fairy tale about a shoemaker…

There are two ways to grow your company's systems. You systemize your company so you can produce some sort of output in a repeatable, scalable way. Without a system the output is produced like a chef who makes great food…

Just answer three questions. Strategy answers "Where are we going?" A Plan answers "How are we going to get there?" As the saying goes - if you don't know where you're going, any road will take you there. But the…

There's actually a maturity scale. In the 1980's Carnegie Mellon University Software Engineering Institute along with the US Department of Defense, developed a way to rank the maturity of software systems. They called it the Capability Maturity Model. I have…

It's not as easy as you think. When you hire people, you expect them to produce some output. The output is the most important part of any function you have people perform. So it makes sense you'd want to measure…

It's the Reason You Hire People. I went over the 4 parts of a function or system in the Twitter thread that may have led you here. [Follow me there @BetterCEO]. Here I want to take a step back to…

Learn how functions helped me run a company 1,500 miles from my home. I'll show you the 3 things a company needs to do and how the CEO function can systemize the company to do them better. Why functions with…

Crafting mission, vision, and values statements are very lucrative - especially for the consultants who run these sessions. But do you need them? Like most things in life, it depends. In this video you'll learn what each of those things…

CEO Time is the most important time you spend running your company. This video from will show you how to get that time and what to do with it. We also cover the Eisenhower matrix - what's important and what's…

Here is the lens through which I view companies. A company is an organization of people that performs a number of different functions designed to create and satisfy customers in a profitable way. Let's take that apart. A company is…

Learn 5 concepts of CEO Thinking. Based on ideas from we cover these five perspectives: - See value through the customers' eyes. - Separate yourself from your company. - The CEO functions as conductor. - See the tasks in your…

Here's a short post to let you know about this video I did called How to Think Like a CEO. . It's a webinar hosted by a couple of my clients - Jo Ann Koontz & Marina Parkin who run…

Learn the 3 things a company needs to do and how the CEO function can systemize the company to do them better. Why functions with an output are a better way to think about your company than jobs. 0:16 CEO…

Time Blocking is a useful technique when you find the urgent is overwhelming the important. It’s based on the concept that you give every hour of your work day a specific task. Here’s how to do it. Make a list…

The paradox is named after James Stockdale who was a POW in Vietnam for over seven years – much of it in solitary. What he found was that his fellow prisoners who broke mentally and ultimately died in prison were…

.

That's a question as well as a headline. I'd love to hear, in the comments below, what's changing for you as your company grows. Here are some things I've noticed in my companies and those of my clients. Even if…

Can I speak honestly? You're probably not functioning as a full-time CEO right now. I know that you are a CEO full time, but that's not everything you do. John Chester of Wild Apple Graphics in Vermont, had a business…

At one extreme, a company is like a one-man band. You do everything. But at the other extreme it's like a symphony orchestra where the conductor doesn't make any of the music the audience has paid to hear. Just like…

In the 1950s Xerox invented a way to make dry copies without wet, smelly chemicals. But that’s not what made them successful. They became one of the largest, most profitable companies on the planet because of another innovation. The copier…

It’s critical that a company have a mission. Having a mission STATEMENT? Not so much. A mission is the reason that a company exists. It doesn’t have to be worthy of a nobel prize. “We make the best damn pizza…

File under: Software I Can NOT Live Without. How much time have you wasted looking for files on your PC? If it’s more than a minute, stop what you’re doing and go to and get a copy of the Everything…

Most entrepreneurs only know one way to spend money. But there are two. And using the wrong one can get you into trouble. Before I tell you about them, you should think of why you spend money in a business.…

In my experience, there are 3 reasons why small firms stop growing. I’m talking about companies with up to 100 employees or so. I don’t know about larger companies, I suspect at that scale the dynamics are different. . Reason…

Talk to people who’ve been married a long time about why their marriages last and you’ll hear that they’re in love. Great. But so is everyone who gets married – even those who will be divorced in 18 months. So…

It takes commitment to build a business - or for that matter, to build anything. But what exactly does that word mean? I've been thinking about it lately and I've come up with this short cut. Commitment is not measured…

A change map is a way to understand the ramifications of a change in your organization (or your life). It could be a change you’ve already adopted, or one you’re considering. It’s a great tool to bring together the smart…

I understand the appeal. After all, didn’t we start our companies because we wanted to make money doing something we love? In my experience the things most entrepreneurs love revolve around sales or making product. Then as the organization grows,…

Here's a picture of my desk. It's got ZERO papers on it. If I'm working on something I'll put that ONE thing on the desk. Then put it away when I'm done, or when I'm interrupted. This concept is new…

How to Build a Scalable Company - Part 2 of 4. This is a 1 hour talk given Sept. 7, 2010 by John Seiffer at the CTECH incubator in New Haven. The topic is why some companies scale and some…

How to Build a Scalable Company - Part 3 of 4. This is a 1 hour talk given Sept. 7, 2010 by John Seiffer at the CTECH incubator in New Haven. The topic is why some companies scale and some…

How to Build a Scalable Company - Part 4 of 4. This is a 1 hour talk given Sept. 7, 2010 by John Seiffer at the CTECH incubator in New Haven. The topic is why some companies scale and some…

How to Build a Scalable Company - Part 1 of 4. This is a 1 hour talk given Sept. 7, 2010 by John Seiffer at the CTECH incubator in New Haven. The topic is why some companies scale and some…

In any new company, there are 4 distinct types of risk to a successful business outcome. It's my experience that seeing these risks in different ways is often at the root of problems between investors and entrepreneurs. Technology Risk. This…

How working with a Business Advisor can help you run your business better. Talks about the things that inspire a company owner to work with a business advisor and become a better CEO.

We must respect the other fellow's religion, but only in the sense and to the extent that we respect his theory that his wife is beautiful and his children smart. -- H. L. Mencken. We all love our own ideas.…

Pricing is a hard topic to deal with systematically. Especially for small companies without a lot of data to crunch. I'm preparing for a pricing session with a client, and thought I'd share a little with you here. We're using…

If the answer is NEVER then you're doing it wrong. Seriously. Check this out: Time Management: How an MIT postdoc writes 3 books, a PhD defence, and 6+ peer-reviews papers. And finishes by 5:30pm. You see you can't really manage…

If you ever read anything about starting or running a business in the press; or if you go to hear people speak about the topic, in all likelihood you'll find they're probably not telling you the unvarnished truth. The Close…

Then click on Lucky Day for a two and a half minute video of some of the luckiest people on earth - pedestrians, drivers, even bank robbers. Stay for the last one - I laughed out loud. On a serious…

I just asked for a meeting with the CEO of a start-up I've invested in. The reason? I just got their half-year report and there's no bad news! Andy, if you're reading this, I'm talking about you. Why is no…

This video of Dan Ariely from TED has several enlightening and surprising ideas you can use. It's 18 min long but the last 2 minutes are an ad. Why people cheat and steal and how this can be encouraged or…

1. Talk to people - Don't assume. Talk to your customers. Ask how the current situation will impact them. Ask how you can make it easier to keep their business. Talk to your vendors and suppliers (Look at point #2…

Seth says: If you are willing to satisfy people with good enough, you can make just about everybody happy. I'd say If you want to make everyone happy you'll HAVE to be satisfied with good enough. [read the whole story…

I mentioned this before but I don't think I gave it the focus it deserves. The focus it deserves is actually in this New Yorker article and a shorter one in Fast Company. But consider this key quote. If someone…

I got this idea from a client - Thanks, Kendra. In meetings when they have an topic on the agenda they allot a certain amount of time to it. Then they set a timer at the start. It keeps the…

What would you pay for a tool that could transmit the wisdom of your smartest people out to everyone in your whole organization? One that is able to reduce errors in the most complex activity and achieve consistent results time…

...is acknowledging what they are worst at. They think they're good (or good enough) at everything. But consider that every company needs to get results in four areas. This means the company needs skills such as: Designing a product customers…

I'm sure you've heard that when you ASSUME it makes an ASS out of U and ME. Here's a way to make assumptions that work. Investors all know that business plans are fiction, or rather fairy tales (fiction sometimes has…

The key to growing your company is to prevent problems rather than solve them. There are two parts to this: Attitude and Skill. Attitude - you must not like being the hero. Heroes solve problems. Usually at the last moment…

We all know about working smarter not harder. But Seth Godin has an interesting insight that we often confuse working longer with working harder (or smarter). Here are a couple of choice quotes. None of the people who are racking…

This from Jessica Hagy who does all kinds of funny, insightful stuff on index cards. But the bigger point is, many people think (no, it's beneath thinking, they just KNOW) that to run (never mind start) a company you have…

1. Does it fit into the big picture? This is the 80/20 rule. Should eliminate 80% of stuff. Of course you have to know what the big picture is. I think many people are afraid to eliminate stuff because it…

This from Paul Orfalea. [founder of Kinkos which got acquired by FedEx and now has 1,200 stores in 10 countries] You must be flexible and astute and focus on the big picture. Busyness is not your friend. Startup entrepreneurs too…

One of the services that makes this blog worth every dollar you pay for it, is the time I take to scour the web and find the gems for you. Two posts in blogs I love come together today under…

It's well known that the pessimist says the glass is half empty - so his surprises are all positive ones. The optimist says the glass is half full and somehow keeps that attitude despite her negative surprises. What does the…

The society which scorns excellence in plumbing because plumbing is a humble activity and tolerates shoddiness in philosophy because it is an exalted activity will have neither good plumbing nor good philosophy. Neither it's pipes nor its theories will hold…

What a thrill it is when that day finally comes. That is the company founder's joy. Also the company founder's deception. Also (potentially) the company's destruction. Joy. Well duh! Now you can finally do what you know needs to be…

You wouldn't ever spend a penny of your company's money without expecting some benefit. You spend advertising to get sales, you spend on inventory to have something to sell. You spend on sales people because they put money in your…

I came across this in a letter by Jim Womack, author of Lean Thinking and, to hear him tell it, one of the developers of the Toyota Way. The graphics are mine - which is why I'm not a graphic…

I agree with Peter Drucker that this one is overrated when running a company. Skill in management is much more important. Nevertheless, leadership can be a useful skill, and it's much simpler than you'd believe by reading or listening to…

I said last time that to function as a CEO, you need a team that doesn’t depend on you for day to day successes. It's hard to build a team like that. Impossible if you don't understand today's topic. Bigger…

I'm not advocating it - just asking you to think what the ramifications would be. Knowing how your absence would affect your company gives insight into what role you really play. The extremes are: Everything would go to hell in…

Solving problems is a typically American approach. We see the West to be conquered, the space race to be won, the journey as a destination, the problem to be solved. And to be sure, there are problems in your business.…

What does a CEO do all day? What do you do all day? Is it good or bad if the answers are not the same? Most business of our size get started because a person can make something or sell…

There's a real gulf between an entrepreneurial business where you can do anything through harder work and an ongoing sustainable business that is run through good management technique. - Bob Jones, owner The Chef's Garden. I think that says it…

"When you're up to your eyeballs in alligators, it's hard to remember that you set out to drain the swamp.". Many clients come to me in that situation. And they feel paralyzed with so many emergencies they don't see how…

I read somewhere that many of the clients of Dominatrixes (what is the plural of dominatrix?) are CEOs - people who spend all day calling the shots and answering to no one. They have a psychological need to be bossed…

An effective schedule is composed solely of Routine, Rocks and Reserves. You should be able to look at your calendar and see them. Routine. This is missing from most entrepreneur's schedule. It's the routine meetings and regular times you review…

When you hire a accountant or a lawyer or someone who charges by the hour, do you really want those hours? Does it make sense that if you ask a question they don't know, and need to research you should…

You've heard that before right? Well, it's not always so easy. I think one thing that sets big companies apart from small companies are how they use measurement in their decisions. Big companies get it wrong because: A) they measure…

When work is physical you need time & motion studies. Frederick Taylor pioneered this around 1900. He found out, for example, that a guy (it was always a guy then) could shovel more stuff in a day if he didn't…

The war analogy doesn't work because business is not a zero sum game. A great business makes the pie bigger for everyone. And in war, you're focused on the enemy (ie your competition) but in business you're supposed to focus…

The Essential Drucker : The Best of Sixty Years of Peter Drucker's Essential Writings on Management (Paperback) by Peter F. Drucker. Almost everything that needs to be said about business management was said by Peter Drucker before anyone else. He…