4 Mukhi (Quad-Faced) CEO!
To become a proven transformational leader and create a successful track record of building brands, businesses and value requires much more than just an opportunity. There is a reason you should care about this.
Joseph Campbell explores the ‘monomyth’ theory in his book and states that important myths from around the world, which have survived for thousands of years, all share a fundamental structure. In a well-known quote from the introduction in The Hero with a Thousand Faces, Campbell summarised the monomyth:
Life is what happens to you when you are planning other things. Becoming the CEO of an MNC and subsequently of new initiatives of a billion-dollar media and entertainment conglomerate in the last decade has been no different.
In my first role as a CEO, who saw the two worlds on both sides of the 2008 recession in the challenged and exciting publishing media industry in India and Asia, the only imperative that I had was to re-imagine my role as a ‘Change Leader’ and donning the role of a ‘Digital Media Evangelist.’
Focusing on the changing economic landscape driven by technological advances enabled us to transform a product-centric publishing company into an ‘integrated brand-centric media company.’ This ensured not only survival but repositioning the company as a robust ‘digital and consumer Publishing’ opportunity and thereby attracting investment by one of the world’s largest international media majors for the still burgeoning and large Indian publishing market.
In the second opportunity as a CEO, who joined a legacy broadcast company to spearhead the foray into launching the ‘factual entertainment’ piece across India and the globe, growth came through transforming the business focus to a brand-centric and multi-platform media business opportunity (TV, Web, Mobile, On-demand streaming, activation) from a legacy TV channel launch.
Fortunately, I was better prepared this time and hit the ground running with multiple other initiatives, the chief one being in identifying a billion-dollar opportunity as an e-commerce evangelist and creating an ecosystem to deliver it from idea to reality stage thereby building and scaling it into a potentially large opportunity canvas.
Working with start-ups exposes one to holding positions of high responsibility and leadership and that too earlier than most of one’s fellow colleagues. Shaping and growing new businesses and building a profitable and large opportunity canvas requires thought leadership, entrepreneurial management style, creative strategy and execution. Most important survival and growth strategy is the ability to re-imagine businesses and build innovative business models.
In delineating the four essential faces for a CEO, I am adapting leading mythologist Joseph Campbell’s description of each of us as “a hero with a thousand faces,” and Erica Fox’s article.
A CEO needs to be like a:
1. Dreamer — this is the visionary face led by intuition, suggestive of an inner CEO.
2. Thinker — this is the evaluation face led by reason, suggestive of an inner CFO.
3. Warrior — this is the relationship face led by will power, suggestive of an inner COO.
4. Lover — this is the relationship face led by emotion, suggestive of an inner CHRO.
A CEO’s job consumes you. It should not be looked at as a step-up but as a calling. Everything ultimately becomes the CEO’s problem, no matter where it starts and becomes the reason why some CEOs crack under pressure. CEOs need to constantly gaze upon their own reflection to see all the four faces.
The author is a tech, media and entrepreneurial leader, and last served as the CEO of New Initiatives, Zee Entertainment Enterprises Limited in India and Asia Pacific region under the ‘Living’ brand.
Disclaimer: The views expressed here are solely those of the author and do not in any way represent the views of exchange4media.com
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Originally published at https://www.exchange4media.com on July 25, 2017.
