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This Book is good for every CEO and entrepeneur reengineering !
This book clearly illustrates to the entrepreneur the different skill sets he/she will have to adopt over the long-term if your company is on a high-growth trajectory. Have you ever noticed that most CEOs aren't the person that founded the company? I have seen many founders resign, step aside to bring in more seasoned managers, etc. The United States is such a successful country because of our capital formation and entrepreneurial spirit. Entrepreneurs create a huge number of jobs as capital and people are always seeking out companies they believe can change the way a certain business is done.
Lets say you have money, you have growth, and you have employees. What do you do to manage these different constituencies and grow the company so you will still be around to see the company prosper? This book clearly provides the roadmap (almost like a blueprint for the fast-growing CEO to adhere to.)
The second group range from board directors, especially if venture capitalists are among them, and trusted personal advisors, especially if the entrepreneur does not have a true board comprised of some seasoned executives or consultants with requisite experience. These are the individuals who are in the best position to make these kind of judgments.
Many years ago, I was in the office of the head of one of the more successful venture capital firms in Boston...let's call him Mr. D. The purpose of our meeting was to discuss a possible collaboration with one of his ventures. As the discussion unfolded, it was clear that his attention was elsewhere, so I asked him if this was the case. He seemed relieved, and emotionally stated that he had just concluded a phone conversation with the outside directors of a promising venture in which he was the lead investor. The venture, with annual revenues over $20 million, was pioneering a new, important technological field. The outside directors were aware of the leadership problems, and were not surprised that Mr. D. was recommending the removal of the founder and his replacement an individual Mr. D. believed had the skills, experience, and desire to lead the company well into the rapid growth phase profitably. This was in spite of Mr. D's several frank one-on-one discussions with the firm's founder that revolved around his bringing in a new CEO, thereby permitting the founder to concentrate on the R&D efforts that were so essential for success. The founder refused to relinquish total control of his baby.
The founder's loss represented a serious setback for the investors, but one if not taken put the venture at extreme risk. It took several years before the company got back on its rapid growth phase while retaining its leadership position in its markets.
Would the entrepreneur have acted differently if he had read Catlin & Matthews' book with its real life examples? I can't tell, but he might have accepted his new role...after all, it would have been in his own self-interest - he owned about 30% of the stock.
Another example. I was on the board of a company facing the same kind of problem. The company had grown from $800,000 in revenues to somewhat over $5 million in 15 months. The CEO confided in me that the joy of building his creation was being displaced by too many operating details. First he brought in a solid COO, but soon thereafter asked us the board to find his replacement. He gave us enough time to do this as we worked out ways we could collaborate with him in the near future.
Similar stories repeated time and time again. Catlin & Matthews offer constructive advise to help entrepreneurs make it through their growth phases - or to counsel them to face reality. Bravo, Katherine and Jana; may your book gain widespread use.
Catlin & Matthews at least spell out for entrepreneurs the nature of the game they are in. To ignore their advice seems, to me, to be foolhardy.
Review: "But the sad reality is that relatively few members of this wave of entrepreneurs will still be in charge when the companies they founded break through to super success." "The mission of Learning at the Speed of Growth is to enable many more entrepreneurs to be great leaders of growth companies."
The book's title is an outstanding one for its subject. The CEO's ability to learn is a key key limit to a company's success. When an improved product or service ignites rapid growth, it is typical for the growth to exceed that of the CEO's ability to learn. The board eventually finds a replacement who already has those lessons under her or his belt.
While no book can teach you everything you need to know, you can use this book as a road map to tell you where you need to go next.
"The irony of entrepreneurial ledership is that the very behaviors and habit patterns that lead to success at one stage of growth contribute to failure in the next stage." Keep that lesson in mind. It's the important take-away from this book.
In the start-up phase, the CEO is both a doer and a decision-maker. In the initial growth phase, the CEO's best roles are as delegator and direction setter. If the CEO tries to keep doing all the key roles, the CEO becomes a stall who delays everything. In the rapid growth phase, the CEO's best roles are as team builder, coach, planner, and communicator. That's the stage where many CEO's don't have the experience to leap the talent chasm within themselves. Think of Chuck Scwab as a good role model here. In the continuous growth phase, the CEO should be a change catalyst, organization builder, promoter of innovation, and chief of culture. Think of Herb Kelleher of Southwest Airlines in that last role.
The book also addresses what the company's focus should be. During start-up, it's developing new products and services. During initial growth, it's driving sales forward. In rapid growth, it is leading the market. And in continuous growth it is dominating the industry. Those who have followed Geoffrey Moore's work will recognize a similarity to the stages he describes in Crossing the Chasm and Inside the Tornado.
The material in the book is greatly improved by sections called "red flags" where warning signs of the need to change are identified.
I found the book to be limited in not providing enough guidance about the roles of the rest of the top management team during these transitions. The work of Adizes on that subject is a good complement to the material in this fine book.
CEOs would do well to find coaches to help them with these transitions if the shifts call for roles for which they have no experience. Those who wish to be CEOs of start-ups would be helped by organizing their careers to get these experiences before becoming a CEO.
A take-away from this book is to think about all of the roles in which you have to change in your life. For example, as a parent, you are initially a loving adult and caregiver for babies. But when you children are 25, they need something different. You need to make those transitions along the way, or you lose the connection to their most urgent emotional, psychological, and physical needs.
Learn the art of improvisation . . . so that you can play any role on a moment's notice!
Leaders looking to build a company to last, and plan on being around to see it, will want to buy this book to help in their own understanding of the stages of company growth that are clearly profiled from the insights and quotes of real life entrepreneurs. More than just understanding stages that a high growth company goes through, it is the recognition of where one's own state of leadership maturity is that may make the difference between your personal growth or being forced to pass the mantle of your company's leadership to a "professional manager."
I found the stages for both company and leadership growth to be dead on in recounting what has been a ten year journey for me - as well as consistent with what I see in the high growth venture backed companies that comprise my customer base.
Even with several aspects of those stages behind me, I find the book to present a useful framework that helped prompt healthy discussion within our management team to stimulate further change.
Martin Babinec CEO, TriNet Group, Inc.
Catlin and Matthews do a good job in tying down the three stages of entrepreneurial development (initial, rapid, and continuous) with anecdotes of successful entrepreneurs. They effectively communicate a lot of "meaty" information in an enjoyable format.
This book has a pearl of wisdom for every entrepreneur. I found myself relating to the stories and learning from the insights that fill every chapter of the book. This is the kind of book that I expect to re-read several times. I am sure that each reading will provide new insights.
Catlin and Matthews did a good job providing great "take-home" value, yet keeping the book easy to read and enjoyable. As an entrepreneur myself, I commend Catlin and Matthews for there great work. This book is truly written by entrepreneurs for entrepreneurs.
Any entrepreneur involved in a fast growing business should read this book. It will help them to understand the changes and transitions that they can expect to go through, both personally and through their business.
Many people would say that entrepreneurs are great at starting companies but there is a time when they have to step aside and let people who know how to run companies take over. Yet some of the greatest companies of our time have had their founders as leaders well past the start up phase. Wal-Mart, Fedex, Microsoft, HP, Siebel, Dell, Disney, Starbucks, Motorola, Sony - just some of the companies where the founders were able to transition from Entrepreneur to CEO. Leading at the Speed of Growth may help you create the next great company. It will certainly help you understand the transitions that a company and its leader goes through as it grows.
The temperature of Heaven can be rather accurately computed from available
data. Our authority is Isaiah 30:26, "Moreover, the light of the Moon
shall be as the light of the Sun and the light of the Sun shall be sevenfold,
as the light of seven days." Thus Heaven receives from the Moon as much
radiation as we do from the Sun, and in addition seven times seven (49) times
as much as the Earth does from the Sun, or fifty times in all. The light we
receive from the Moon is one ten-thousandth of the light we receive from the
Sun, so we can ignore that. With these data we can compute the temperature
of Heaven. The radiation falling on Heaven will heat it to the point where
the heat lost by radiation is just equal to the heat received by radiation,
i.e., Heaven loses fifty times as much heat as the Earth by radiation. Using
the Stefan-Boltzmann law for radiation, (H/E)^4 = 50, where E is the absolute
temperature of the earth (~300K), gives H as 798K (525C). The exact
temperature of Hell cannot be computed, but it must be less than 444.6C, the
temperature at which brimstone or sulphur changes from a liquid to a gas.
Revelations 21:8 says "But the fearful, and unbelieving ... shall have their
part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone." A lake of molten
brimstone means that its temperature must be at or below the boiling point,
or 444.6C (Above this point it would be a vapor, not a lake.) We have,
then, that Heaven, at 525C is hotter than Hell at 445C.
-- "Applied Optics", vol. 11, A14, 1972
Destiny is a good thing to accept when it's going your way. When it isn't,
don't call it destiny; call it injustice, treachery, or simple bad luck.
-- Joseph Heller, "God Knows"
