My Guests This is a very special episode of In The Trenches: In today’s episode, I will be interviewing 4 different CEOs of 4 different SMBs, and asking them just a single question: “What are some of the seemingly small changes you’ve made that have had the largest impacts?” When taking over a new business,Continue reading “The Smallest Changes That Had the Largest Impacts: 4 CEO Case Studies”
Tag Archives: HR
Mike Zani, CEO of The Predictive Index: Hiring, Personality Profiling Tools, Working with a Partner, and Other Lessons from 20 Years as a CEO
My Guests My guest today is Mike Zani, CEO of The Predictive Index. The Predictive Index serves more than 9,000 clients across 142 countries, helping businesses optimize their hiring and team composition decisions through a combination of behavioral science, software, and professional consulting from the world’s top workplace behavior specialists. Mike has been CEO ofContinue reading “Mike Zani, CEO of The Predictive Index: Hiring, Personality Profiling Tools, Working with a Partner, and Other Lessons from 20 Years as a CEO”
Knowing Who, When, and How to Fire
I will never forget the first time that I had to fire somebody. In the days, hours and minutes leading up to the meeting that morning, sleep was elusive, my heart was racing, my mind was completely incapable of focusing on anything else, and the sense of existential dread growing in the pit of myContinue reading “Knowing Who, When, and How to Fire”
Employee Burnout and The Great Resignation
My Guest My guest today is Carin-Isabel Knoop, Executive Director of the Harvard Business School Case Research & Writing Group. Carin has spent decades writing cases on managers and leaders all over the world across a wide array of functions and industries. In 2019, alongside co-author John Quelch, Carin published Compassionate Management of Mental HealthContinue reading “Employee Burnout and The Great Resignation”
A Leader’s Most Important Skill
Listen to This Blog Post Though effective leaders tend to possess a multitude of different skills and abilities, my experience as a CEO taught me that the most important skill for any leader to possess is that of clear and effective communication. Indeed, a CEO’s strategy is only as good as her ability to communicateContinue reading “A Leader’s Most Important Skill”
Rich Manders: Lessons from Founding, Growing, Buying, Selling, Coaching, and Investing in SMBs
My Guest Rich Manders Co-Founded and led iAutomation, a Massachusetts-based machine control and automation company, and grew the business from $0 to $90M in sales with 180 employees. After selling that business to The Riverside Company (a leading global Private Equity firm), Rich stayed on with the business, and alongside his partners at Riverside, grewContinue reading “Rich Manders: Lessons from Founding, Growing, Buying, Selling, Coaching, and Investing in SMBs”
Why Your Company Needs a Set of Core Values (or Why Yours May Not be Having an Impact)
Listen To This Blog Post Particularly in my early years as a CEO, I couldn’t help but roll my eyes whenever somebody suggested that I needed to codify and publish a set of core values for my company. Weren’t core values the tired, hollow, and meaningless platitudes that companies created simply because they felt theyContinue reading “Why Your Company Needs a Set of Core Values (or Why Yours May Not be Having an Impact)”
Sales: Hiring, Onboarding, Compensating, Scaling & Supporting a World Class Sales Team
My Guest Dave Prusinksi is the Chief Revenue Officer at SafeAI, a hyper-growth silicon valley company in the autonomous vehicle space. Prior to his current role, Dave spent 10 years as the Executive Vice President of Sales and Marketing at FleetComplete, a technology provider to fleet-owning businesses around the world. Under Dave’s leadership, FleetComplete grewContinue reading “Sales: Hiring, Onboarding, Compensating, Scaling & Supporting a World Class Sales Team”
Hiring Your Senior Leadership Team
Listen to This Blog Post: There is no single recipe for building a great company, nor is there a definitive formula for becoming a truly effective leader. Anything that you hear or read that suggests otherwise should be treated with a high level of skepticism. Even among the world’s most successful and admired CEOs, thereContinue reading “Hiring Your Senior Leadership Team”