CEO Close-Up, Trends, Reports & Analyses
Avoid Pitfalls, Co-op Leaders Told
INDIAN WELLS, Calif.—Leadership starts at the top, but there’s a right way and a wrong way to go about it.
Denny Strigl offered his leadership insights at the 2012 CEO Close-Up. (Photo By: Michael W. Kahn)
That was the message a veteran executive of one of the nation’s top wireless firms offered electric cooperative leaders gathered here for the 2012 CEO Close-Up.
Denny Strigl was CEO of Verizon Wireless, and later the president and chief operating officer of Verizon Communications. He came here Jan. 23 to speak to some 300 co-op managers and industry partners.
Strigl started by looking at some of the reasons managers struggle, beginning with a tendency to “focus on the wrong things.”
Strigl urged co-op managers to develop a set of fundamental issues—member service, or safety, for example—and then make sure that everything they do during the day focuses on at least one of those.
“Those who fail usually focus on so many other things,” Strigl said, citing email as one of a manager’s “biggest distractions.”
Strigl said a second reason that managers struggle is their desire to keep people happy.
“Good results don’t come from happy people,” he said, “but when good results are obtained, your people are happy.”
Whether at a cell phone giant or a co-op, Strigl told the audience that being a successful manager “must start with what is one of your key core values, and that is integrity.”
Strigl said it goes beyond just being honest. “Integrity to me is doing the right thing even when no one is watching.”
Finally, Strigl warned managers not to get “hung up on themselves.”
“It is more important to be part of the group,” he said, “to give credit to the group, to give credit to the organization, to give credit to the company, rather than take credit yourself.”
That said, Strigl isn’t shy to acknowledge his shortcomings. He did just that as a way of urging co-op leaders to keep a sharp eye out for innovations. It was a story about when he was first presented with the idea of text messaging.
“I said, ‘This is a cockamamie idea. Who is ever going to do this?’”
“Do you know how many text messages were sent last year? Two trillion 52 billion.”
“It is a phenomenal success story that as a CEO I was ready to forego,” Strigl said. “Oftentimes, these opportunities are right in front of you, and we don’t see them.”