Posted On August 29, 2017
Being a CEO isn’t easy. It never was—but it is a harder job than it used to be. Why?
The number of things a CEO—or really anyone with “Chief,” “Vice President,” or “Director” in front of the rest of their title—needs to keep their eye on has grown significantly over the past 20 years.
Technology is just one of those things.
In 1995 there were roughly 16 million Internet users. That’s around the equivalent of 40% of the population of California using the Internet. Except those 16 million users were spread across the entire globe. Today that number is 3.8 billion. It wasn’t until 2013 that 50% of the United States population owned a smartphone. Four years later that number is over 80%, and climbing. The pace of technological change isn’t the only new addition to the list of things senior managers and owners have to worry about. Local, state, and federal regulations have been growing steadily for decades—and those are just domestic regulatory requirements. Companies that operate globally must contend with multiple sets of regulations and international standards.
If you are manufacturing components of one product in several different countries, the regulatory burden is incredibly high. And really, every company operates in a global environment. Even if you are not opening offices in Beijing, there is a good chance you are sourcing at least some of your components and products from an international supplier. Even if you are not doing that (which, again, is unlikely), you need to be aware of the international environment before you face sudden competition from a foreign competitor you’ve never heard of. (Ask Ford or Chevrolet how well tolerating inefficiency and ignoring foreign competitors works out. They took that route in the 1960s—and were never the same again.)
The point is that CEOs and senior management must keep their focus on the big picture—and that picture is bigger and more complicated than it used to be. They need to be adept at seeing 5, 10, or 20 years into an unknown future. You can’t do that if you’re focused on the minutia of daily business. As a CEO or senior leader, you have to be confident that daily operational tasks and processes are being performed as efficiently and productively as possible.
That is especially true for your supply chain. Transportation, logistics, and supply chains are an area of your business where a failure in an operational function can turn into a big disaster. Still, business leaders in today’s competitive, complicated landscape have to minimize the amount of time they spend focusing on routine operational functions. The solution?
Partnering with the Flat World Holdings family of companies to make sure your supply chain, custom crating, freight forwarding, and transportation management needs are operating with maximum visibility and efficiency. As a senior leader, you can’t afford to spend too much time focusing on the “little things.” (Especially when the little things can become big problems.)
But you also can’t afford underperformance or inefficiency.
That’s where our family of companies can help. And we look forward to working with you.