Three different pathways to the CEO’s desk
Canuja.nadkarni@stuff.co.nz
hief executive: The term is redolent with the glamour, power and money that comes from having climbed your way to the top of the corporate ladder.
When those two magic words are added to your business card, you know you’ve made it.
But it’s a long and winding road to the pinnacle of corporate power in the country’s largest companies.
Unless, that is, you decide to launch your own business, and bestow the title on yourself.
Here are the stories of two men and one woman on their route to the title, and their tips on how to unleash the inner chief executive in all of us. years. She still manages Fish Fish and Burger Burger. Gilmour-Buckley said her leadership style had evolved over her career. ‘‘When growing a business the chief executive’s role shifts from being hands-on to becoming strategic.’’
For Gilmour-Buckley, this was hard because she enjoyed the hands-on aspect of business.
In 2014 when she sold her Mexico shares, Gilmour-Buckley sought advice from EY partner Jo Doolan, who told her she was good at the first parts of setting up a business – coming up with the idea, and making it work. ‘‘She said to me: ‘Let’s just face it – [after that] you get bored. The smartest thing you can do is walk away and hire someone that’s good at it.’ ’’ said the transition was one of the biggest challenges in his career.
‘‘The hardest challenge, by far, the biggest and toughest decision was getting old Telecom to turn around and become the new, growing Spark. The complexity of Spark is beyond any business I’ve worked in prior.’’
Moutter said he was a demanding chief executive but this attitude got the job done. ‘‘You can’t let leadership turn into a soft, warm and fuzzy thing
. . . It doesn’t matter how nice a company is to work for if it’s unsuccessful.’’
Spark reported a profit of $385 million after tax for the year to June 30, down 8 per cent from a year earlier.
Moutter said his advice to budding entrepreneurs was to say ‘‘yes’’ to new opportunities. Morrison said every leader needed empathy. ‘‘The ability to put yourself in the shoes of others, your employees and customers and learn is vital.’’
Like Gilmour-Buckley, Morrison said his leadership style had changed over time. ‘‘We’ve gone from un-boxing banana boxes at 4am to being able to employ people to do those things. We try now to work on the business rather than in the business. Step back and let smarter people run the business day to day.’’ Karma Cola is an international operation ‘‘so you can never escape your phone and emails’’. ‘‘People will have some really great ways of switching off but I just haven’t achieved that myself. But if you’re really enjoying it, it doesn’t feel like work.’’