Is Your Gatekeeper Holding the Keys To Your Office or Your Kingdom?
Who holds the keys to your kingdom?
“This is great, but we should have started six months ago.”
That statement was said to me by the CEO of a not insignificant Melbourne manufacturing company last week. Mindset has just commenced a large organisational transformation project with them that will see significant cultural and personnel change over the next 12 months. The company has been losing market share and profit dramatically so the CEO is perched precariously on a burning platform.
Let’s analyse his statement.
Mindset cold called him a month ago and started the discussion that led to the project’s commencement, BUT… We had been trying repeatedly to get that meeting for over eight months prior. We were being blocked by his overzealous PA. She screened his emails, his phone calls and mail. We finally made direct contact via social media and got the meeting. The glare the PA gave us as we arrived for our first meeting was priceless.
So, the upshot is we could have commenced the project six months ago if it hadn’t been for the PA. The delay has made the project much more challenging and much more expensive. There’s also now less profit in the company’s accounts to pay for it.
The CEO is now wondering how many other strategic opportunities he has missed out on because his PA thinks she knows what the company, and he, needs better than him.
The moral of this is that many CEOs have similarly overzealous gatekeepers. They go by many names and titles. Operationally they can save a leader significant time, but strategically they can also shield them from opportunities, valuable market information and innovative new suppliers. Often this cost will massively outweigh any perceived administrative benefit.
If you are a CEO with a PA what are you missing out on?
Aaron Dodd
Talent Director
As a journalist, I come across gatekeepers all the time. I might be calling their boss to comment on a (often positive) story. Or to profile them for an article. Typically, it’s great publicity for the person or organisation.
However, it amazes me when the gatekeepers simply tell me that their boss is very busy. Often, they don’t understand the concept of a deadline and believe that we should hold off “the news” until their boss can fit in time to talk.
If I can’t wait as I need to meet my deadline, I’ll often have to get a quote from their competitor. SO their competitor ends up with fabulous publicity instead of them. Many wonderful publicity opportunities can be lost if gatekeepers aren’t trained to triage calls properly.
Valerie Khoo
http://www.valeriekhoo.com
Journalist and Director of http://www.sydneywriterscentre.com.au
Thanks for your comments Valerie. From other comments I received since publishing this blog it’s clear that the most successful CEOs are the ones that remain the most contactable, connected. That’s what business is about after all!