“GBO” – Why executives and senior leaders are so busy?
18/03/2019

In a previous job a long time ago, I was sharing a late-night beer with the Chairman of our company, at that time based in Austin, Texas – the gun capital of the USA. As well as explaining how he had two guns in his Ferrari, had learned to accurately shoot people at distance, and how he was about to marry his fourth wife of 20-something (he was in his sixties!), he said he’d be very disappointed if he didn’t see his Chief Executive staring out of the window of his office at least once every day. Not because of the nice view! Because he wanted him to spend his time thinking! About strategic things like the way the world was changing and how our company could take advantage of it and stay ahead of the competition!
On our travels, we see so many Executives and Senior Managers busy with meetings, diaries overflowing, getting involved in all sorts of detail! Hands-on, so people might say!
The Glimpse of the Blindingly Obvious (GBO) is that these senior people are spending most of their time down at the tactical level or “transaction-level” of the organisation, rather than at the strategic level!
Why?
Because it seems very hard to let go – it’s easier to drop down a level and be busy doing things, attending meetings, making decisions (perhaps), taking action, approving others’ actions, reacting to (rather than educating) regulators – rather than thinking about things and really understanding what they should be focusing on, while letting the rest of the organisation get on and do the doing.
Bob Garratt wrote a great little book about this in 1990 (Creating a Learning Organisation – A Guide to Leadership, Learning and Development). Takes a couple of hours to read, but much longer to understand!
There’s a two-page Sloan Management Review from MIT – takes 15 minutes to read. Maybe a bit longer to understand and implement! https://sloanreview.mit.edu/article/what-the-military-can-teach-organizations-about-agility/
The essence is to build an organisation based on a clear Central Intent (or Purpose), with clear Principles, and Business Processes that work to Implement them. We’ve seen many times where senior managers have struggled to get this right – where the processes they’re responsible for just aren’t working properly. And instead of creating the right processes, with quality of outcome built in, they spend all their time at the transaction-level – following each and every job (or project, or programme, or business change, or call and response to the public / customer, etc.) going into the process and using all their effort (reprioritising, escalating, etc. – you’ve been there!) trying to make sure it comes out right! They focus their understanding at the job- or transaction-level, rather than at the process-level.
But if you do get things right, you’ll be surprised just how much your team can get on with the job without you being around to “lead” them! And you can spend a bit more time staring out of the window!
Categories & Tags:
Leave a comment on this post:
You might also like…
Engineering problem to solve? Let Knovel help you find a solution
Did you know that Knovel provides you with more than just eBooks? Knovel is a key database for many engineering, mechanical and materials courses here at Cranfield University, and contains content from an extensive range ...
Working on your group project? We can help!
When undertaking a group project, typically you'll need to investigate a topic, decide on a methodology for your investigation, gather and collate information and data, share your findings with each other, and then formally report ...
Words matter – a conversational Integrated Vehicle Health Management lexicon
There are many well established barriers to successful digital transformation which prevent full realisation of desired benefits. It is generally recognised that only 30% of digital transformation efforts deliver these results. One of the ...
Library support for new research students
Welcome! We are very excited to welcome you to Cranfield, and we are looking forward to supporting you throughout your research degree. We are always happy to help you – all you need to do ...
Finding full-text Economist articles…
If you’re looking for The Economist, the place to go is ProQuest One Business. Follow these step-by-step instructions to get full-text access. Login here and click on the Publications option at the top, above the ...
New IEEE route to gold open access for UKRI-funded research
You probably know by now that if you publish a paper that acknowledges funding from UKRI (including Innovate UK) it must be made open access immediately upon publication with a CC-BY licence. To remind you, ...