So you want to be a CEO

I was treated to dinner tonight by a name you would recognize. He requested confidence, so I won’t even hint at his identity. I will footnote that this struck me as a little odd, considering the notoriety he’s seemed to enjoy, not to mention the large sums of money that went with it.

He’s come to grips with the fact that he’s at the end of that career and is eager to start a new one. He’s creating a company. His lawyer advised him to talk with a number of people about that and I was on the list.

I made a few of suggestions but the basic plan was decide what industry or company he had a passion for and approach an owner about employment that would transition into a buyout, giving him a chance to learn the ropes.

No sale. He wasn’t going to work for someone, he wanted to create his own thing from scratch that reflected him (and his name) and he wanted to do it now. He wasn’t that fussy about what industry and how it was trending, although he would like to do something cool.

There was more to it than that, but here’s what it boiled down to, although I’m not sure he was completely tuned in. He wanted the title of company president, the prestige of that along with being the founder, the corner office with a view and an army of minions poised to do his bidding. Whether or not it made money was almost irrelevant. He had money. Yes, but there’s more prestige in running something profitable.

Okay, this is easy. Kind of like designing a motorcycle that looks as hot as a Ducati but doesn’t have to match it in performance (or even run).

I gave him some basic building blocks of starting a company and asked if he had any questions about that. He wanted to know if I thought he should keep his present car or would a Porsche Panamera or Mercedes S class be more of a CEO image. He didn’t need me. He needed “Queer Eye for the Straight Guy.”

I told him he didn’t have a passion for starting a company, which was what was required. What he wanted was to be a CEO. That didn’t seem to register and he just plowed ahead, almost giddy with the prospects.

When we were wrapping up, he laughed. “One thing I’m not going to miss is the nutty fans, especially the babes who try to latch onto you. Don’t get me wrong. Most of the people are cool, but there’s always a few who are just whacked out. I’ll be glad to move on from that.” Guess again.

I have found over the years that many employees covet the CEO’s position and think it’s all sweetness and light. They have no idea what the trials and tribulations are, especially in this area.

When you’re the CEO, you’re the authority figure. That’s fine, more or less, for the stable minds in the organization, which are the vast majority. But, there are others who have problems with authority. Or, some further out on the bell curve will engage in transference. That is, in their minds, the CEO becomes the former husband who dominated them, the father who never approved, the older sibling who bullied or some other figure who evokes inappropriate emotion and behavior.

I gave him the brief version although I don’t think it took root. In his eyes, I thought I saw him decorating his new office. Hope it’s big enough for his new fans.