CEO as Chief System Designer
Martin's claim about the one strategy job a CEO cannot delegate: designing the coherence of the Enabling Management Systems. The logic: every function designs its own systems well and locally (The Barnacle Problem).
The logic: every function designs its own systems well and locally (The Barnacle Problem). Only one person has both the visibility across all systems and the authority to change any of them. If the CEO doesn't own coherence, no one does, and incoherence is the default.
What the role requires:
- Treating budgeting, planning, performance review, incentives and promotion criteria as one signal system, not separate administrative machinery
- Uninstalling systems that motivate obsolete behaviour, not just installing new ones
- Continuous small adjustment, Honing vs Transformation, rather than periodic dramatic redesign
- Modelling the signal personally, because Leader Behaviour Is the Signal when systems conflict
The failure mode: a CEO who approves the strategy and delegates "implementation", leaving the nervous system wired for the previous strategy while expecting new behaviour.
Our synthesis of Roger Martin’s published work, sources credited. Read the originals: they’re excellent.
Reading about method is not the same as running it. We install this system and build the capability that stays.
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