What a CEO does

A good CEO spends most of his or her time thinking, analysing, and designing. Not running things. Not making a hundred little decisions. Not putting out fires. Not schmoozing with customers. Not playing politics.

The CEO’s main job is to design and establish an organisational machine that always achieves the goals of the company.

This includes designing systems that work all the time and rarely fail to deliver. This includes finding and developing the right people. People who don’t have to be constantly supervised, monitored, or motivated. It includes designing work processes that don't have to constantly be fixed. It includes designing work processes that normal people can operate without super-human efforts and major stress. The word for all this is robust. Robust means the systems can take challenges and not break or fail to achieve goals.

The CEO must be ever alert for problems and opportunities. There are always a few problems coming at the corporation that will seriously challenge its ability to survive. A good CEO sees them very early. Earlier than everyone else. He already has the strategy and fixes in place before they arrive. The good CEO also sees those very few opportunities that will make or break the company over the long haul. Again, the good CEO sees them earlier than everyone else. He capitalizes on them quickly and decisively.

A good CEO can sometimes make a single decision in his or her career that decides the fate of a company for the next ten years. They can make a single decision whose economic impact can pay their salary forever. I have done it on more than one occasion.

What a CEO should do is handle strategic issues. These are things that are unknown to the average worker.

A good CEO must also have a deep understanding of what business the company is in and insure that the business strategy does not drift or creep away from the core business.

Rediscover Your Purpose In 15 Days: What You Need To Know

Day 1: Define purpose On average, people spend 90,000 hours on the job over the course of their lives. So it’s no wonder that nine in 10 workers would take a pay cut if it meant having the opportunity to participate in more purposeful work. But what is “purpose,” and do we really have to have it? Day 2: Establish what you have Before you can rediscover your purpose, you should identify your passions, your talents and what you have: a job, a career or a calling. One isn’t better than another, but it’s important to know which one you have and which one you want. Day 3: Remember what drives you Now that you’ve established what you have and what you want, it’s time to sit back and reflect on the last time you felt a sense of purpose and when you lost it. By looking at yourself from a different perspective, you’ll be able to do just that. Day 4: Put purpose in perspective Are you setting the bar too high when it comes to finding purpose at work? Learn how many meaningful moments people actually need, according to research, in order to love their work—and their lives. Day 5: Take stock of your days If meaning is found in particular moments, you should account for how you’re spending yours. Grab a pencil and paper and get ready to sketch out your typical day through these three exercises, meant to reveal the times you’re most likely to rediscover your purpose. Day 6: Understand how you fit This may sound like a simple matter, one that can be resolved by reviewing an organizational chart, but understanding how you fit in your organization is about much more than knowing to whom everyone reports. To truly gain insight into how you fit in, you should have a conversation with your manager. Day 7: Craft your tasks You don’t have to change jobs to rediscover your purpose—in fact, sometimes all it takes is a little redesign. This is your guide to the first phase of job crafting: task crafting. Day 8: Invest in your career At a time when the skills you need to succeed change more quickly than you can update your resume, career development is an absolute must. But investing in your professional growth is about much more than making yourself marketable—it’s something you do for you and can help you find fulfillment at work. Day 9: Craft your relationships A relationship strategy is probably not an explicit part of your career development plan, but it should be. Learn how to create one and how to align your daily interactions with your purpose. Day 10: Find your balance When you take care of yourself outside the office, you lay the foundation for your career to thrive in the long term. Here are a few simple strategies anyone can utilize to create a better work-life balance. Day 11: Craft your perceptions You can do all the task and relationship crafting you want, but if you don’t do the same with your perceptions, you’re not going to get all that far. Perception crafting is all about changing the way you think about your job and about when and how you experience meaning at work. Day 12: Connect with something bigger When just four in 10 employees say the mission of their company makes them feel as though their job matters, it’s no wonder so many people spend their days questioning their role in the bigger picture. The good news is that you can take steps toward bridging this gap. Day 13: Look outside the office If you’re struggling to rediscover your purpose inside the office, why not look outside? No, that doesn’t necessarily mean a job search is in order—volunteer work or even a side project you’re passionate about should do the trick. Day 14: Learn how to say what you want At a time when employee turnover costs companies upwards of $600 billion annually, chances are that your boss would rather make a few adjustments to your role than risk losing you and affecting the company’s bottom line. The key is to take everything you’ve learned about what drives you and present your redesigned role to your manager in a way that will benefit both you and the business. Day 15: Embrace the journey You’ve defined purpose, taken stock of your days and crafted every aspect of your job. But it’s likely that what you consider to be fulfilling today will change over the course of your life. Whether or not you’ve been reminded of the “why” behind your work, embrace the journey.