At the end of a recent interview, the reporter asked for the proper spelling of my name, and my title. He dutifully wrote my correct title, 2EO, and emailed me later that week, “Can I refer to you as co-chief executive officer? ‘2EO’ will never make it past my editor.”
I thought it was odd that my actual title wouldn’t be accepted by his editor. Would 2EO repel readers, or cause their advertisers to pull out? I realize the title is unusual, so - for future editors - let me explain.
Dear Editor,
I share the 2EO title with another smarty at work for three reasons:
1. Having one CEO is like using typewriters in an age of email.
Peter Drucker said, “The bottleneck is always at the top of the bottle.” Having one Chief Executive Officer is outdated, and slows down the work. It maybe makes sense when business is conducted in a single geographic region and has fewer than 250 employees and clients. At that scale, the CEO can know what’s going on, and be a good steward of decisions and direction.
But once a company tips past 200 or 250 people - or expands its footprint - having one person at the helm is silly.
There’s a simple reason for this: most people can’t remember more than 250 names. And when a CEO loses track of her people and clients, her ability to lead slips. (I learned ‘the rule of 250’ and other good stuff from Walt.)
Many companies get around the leadership bottleneck by having many people with “Chief” in their title. Trouble is, these are functional titles, e.g. Operations, Finance, Administration, Sales and Marketing, etc., and still roll up to one chief, the CEO. There’s very little true collaborative leadership in companies. Collaboration is scary for some people. Especially Americans. Enter the U.S. military…
2. Top-down leadership was invented by the military to fight wars.
And it worked very well… until wars got more complex. My dad was a WWII vet. After 9-11, he was comparing WWII to the war on terror and said, “My war was easier. We knew who to shoot, because we wore different colored uniforms.”
The Pentagon admits that command-and-control training is out of date, and now favors simulations that train the front lines with video game titles like Think Like a Commander. In a world where wars - and business - are complex, everyone needs to think and act like a leader.
3. We want to set good examples.
We’re committed to building a strengths-based company, one that encourages people to work in their talents. (Cue the curtain call for Job Description management, where people are pigeons with holes to fill.)
Yes, it’s uncharted territory. Yes, it makes some people nervous. But the upside is so huge! Strengths-based teams are ten times more productive than other teams, and a hell of a lot more fun.
So when we committed to building a strengths-based organization, we knew we had to start at the top.
Truth is, no one in our company has all the strengths to lead it. But between us, Marti and I had most of them, plus a boat-load of trust between us. So we simply looked at all the things we had to do as leaders, and divied them up based on our strengths.
Who knows? As our company grows, we might have 3EOs, 4EOs or more. For now, 2EOs will do.
Editor, thank you for taking these intentions into consideration as you decide whether to print my actual title, or one that will be more comfortable for you, your readers, and advertisers.
Very truly yours,
Rebecca Ryan
PS: After I posted, my friend Michael Epstein sent me a link to this article about Millennials in the Military, and their allergy to Command and Control.
