The Corner Office

CEO Blog

#2: Your First Team Doesn’t Work Like One You walk into executive team meetings expecting alignment—and instead get polite updates, turf wars, and half-hearted consensus. That’s not a First Team. That’s a group of silo leaders pulling in different directions. And when your First Team fractures, execution fragments. Growth bottlenecks. Enterprise value erodes. The Enterprise

#1: You’re Stuck In the Business—Not Leading On the Business Leading a mid-market company is exhilarating—and exhausting. But here’s the hard truth: when you spend most of your time in tactical meetings, operational firefighting, and decision fatigue, you’re not leading—you’re surviving. And survival mode leaks value. Productivity slows. Strategic bets stall. Leaders disengage. The Enterprise

I was with a mid-market CEO recently who said: “Every year our planning feels like a financial exercise. We sit around the table, tweak the budget, and call it strategy.” That’s not strategy. And it’s not how you build enterprise value. If you want to grow with intention, your plan for 2029 — and your

A CEO told me recently: “We always end the year with good intentions, but by the time we finalize our plan, Q1 is already slipping away. We spend more time catching up than leading.” That’s the danger of waiting too long. If you want to create enterprise value in 2026, you can’t afford to coast

A CEO I work with once told me: “Every December, we scramble to finalize next year’s plan, and by the time it’s ready, Q1 is already half over.” The result? Teams reacting instead of executing. Opportunities missed. Growth stalled. That’s the danger of waiting too long to plan. If you want to hit the ground

(Just Ask the CEO Who Did) Strategy isn’t just about vision. It’s about making informed decisions—where to double down, where to expand, and, just as critically, where not to go. One of the most overlooked competitive advantages in business today isn’t technology, talent, or capital. It’s insight. Real, unfiltered insight from your customers, employees, and

You’re well into the third quarter. Urgent priorities are piling up, the year-end is coming fast—and yet, the most powerful thing you can do right now has nothing to do with finishing this year strong. It has everything to do with shaping what’s next. Because 2026 won’t wait, and great CEOs know that the seeds

You’re already planning for 2026—setting growth targets, sharpening your strategy, and aligning the organization to what’s next. But here’s the real question: Do you have the right people in place to get you there? Many CEOs claim that “talent is our #1 priority.” But far fewer are putting in the work to prove it. And

It’s easy to see your Board of Directors as a formality—an oversight group that meets quarterly, reviews the numbers, asks a few questions, and signs off on decisions. But great CEOs know better. They know a high-functioning Board isn’t just a governance requirement—it’s a strategic advantage. And trust is the currency that powers it. According

There’s a moment every CEO eventually faces. You’re staring at a dashboard filled with charts, spreadsheets, and KPIs. Revenue is up. Costs are steady. But something feels…off. Your gut says things aren’t as strong as the numbers suggest. Engagement is waning. Innovation has slowed. Culture feels stagnant. That’s when it hits you: You’re measuring performance—but