Hire the Leader Your Business Actually Needs | JG Christman

speaker-0: Thousand Days. That's enough time to transform a company, but not enough time to waste. Welcome to the 1000 Day CEO, the podcast about decisive leadership, sustainable growth, and building a business that thrives beyond any one leader. Your host is Bill Canady. Let's make every day count.

speaker-1: Welcome everyone to the Thousand Day CEO. I'm Bill Canady, and this is where we get inside the decisions that build enterprise value. Today I'm joined by Joe Christman, a managing partner, managing partner at DHR Global and a former naval aviator. Joe works in executive search, helping companies find the leaders they need for consequential assignments. He also writes about leadership, artificial intelligence, and human judgment, including his book Good and Evil in the Age of Simulation. We're going to talk about choosing the right leader for the job ahead, finding out who can actually deliver, and taking and keeping responsibility for the decisions that matter. Joe, welcome to the show.

speaker-0: Thank you, Bill. Glad to be here.

speaker-1: I thought we'd kick off with a real search. So maybe if you wouldn't mind, take us into an executive search where the business needs were something different from what the original job description said. What was happening and what changed your view of the leader that was needed?

speaker-0: That's that's a great question. let me think just a second. Yeah, I mean I can look at a a couple of different searches because that happens. We write the mandate before we start anything. We actually experiment with the mandate. We we go back and forth with the job descriptions for executive leadership. And sometimes, you know, you find out that someone else had an agenda that was a little bit different and and you're having that weekly or bi-weekly or you know, other week progress reviews where you're reviewing. you know, the progress you're making in the marketplace against the need that the client feels that they're looking for. It's been a certain search, especially in Volatole programs in in the A and D business, to have a lot of pressure. I can name a search we were working on for what was a program I could say it is old enough now for SIBRS which is space based infrared system, which was a replacement for what was DSP, which is our overarching global missile defense capability which is in action right now. It's basically been here. It's not Golden Dome, but it was the beginning of what that dome may look like for the United States. So SIBRS was on the on the on the on the on the ropes a little bit as a program, Lockheed and Aerojet were the clients and they were the team partners on on on the on the on the s on on it. The Air Force was pressuring them and they were in critical need of a VP of programs for the SIBRS program. specifically on the aerojet side, which was the payload side. Lockheed has the spacecraft and the bus. Their their electro optic IR system was gonna go on that satellite. So what you found out was there's a lot of dead bodies in that wake of that program. And so you know you're sitting there, you know, you're fishing around and you're making calls. You're talking to at the time it was TRW that's now north of Grumman. You had Hughes down the road, you had Boeing and a few others. But You just found out that there was a lot of a lot of we'll say, edginess from between the losers and the winners of that program. So it was hard to pick the losers and say, Hey, you wanna come over to the guys that actually won it? 'Cause they just lost it a few years ago. The other side of it was everybody had an opinion about everybody else. We we eventually filled it and the fill he lasted probably another three years down the road, which was probably good for that program considering how rapidly they were turning over their own personnel and locking and and and aerojet. But Yeah, so you can change, especially when you're dealing with the aerospace and defense, especially the defense industry, where there's history, there's legacy, there's all kind of things.

speaker-1: You know, when you're going through that, what's your role in getting that to work out?

speaker-0: First and foremost is trying to listen and read between the lines. I was working with the president of Aerojet and the EVP of Lockheed Martin Space. Those guys will you can read those guys sometimes and you can't. I was also dealing with their senior HR leaders, you know, who were kind of coordinating the information flow. So a search starts out pretty much by breaking down the marketplace and looking for all the segments and then reading the orb charts or finding things out that you need to know on who's who. And You know, it's it's interesting because there's people that have moved out of let's say Lockheed, they were in Honeywell. Can we trace that back to the right experience, especially in space systems? It's space always feels like they're different. They don't want an airplane guy. They don't want a missile guy. They want someone who understands electronics outside the atmosphere. So when you're dealing with that, you gotta make sure you got the right person. And then the other side it's just the skill sets and the and their personality. Can they can they break through and convince the two people that I mentioned? That they were the right guy to fix the program because it was in trouble.

speaker-1: So you talked about that the gentleman, I believe gentleman who got it, lasted three years. Was he able to make a big impact in that period of time? Were they happy with what they chose? I

speaker-0: He was a resilient guy. I came out of a a competitive organization. It took a w while to kind of pry him out. You know, it took a few calls, a few times and a few obviously we were we were stumbling, you know, in in the in the in the progress because of the hidden agendas, but finally he got it and I think I think he was just able to to stick with it just to get it out of harm's way. And I think after that he was saying, I'm not gonna put up with this anymore, I got another job someplace else. No that

speaker-1: T I see that all the time. Before you pick the candidate, a lot of time it's around getting the owner or board to agree before they start interviewing. What must they agree on with the business that needs accomplishing for it to be really a successful outcome? Yeah.

speaker-0: You know, one of those things is that listening side. And and and make I write, you know, I could get a tear sheet from an HR guy on a position description within the organization. They keep those kind of files. But it's really getting behind that and understanding the must haves, the nice to haves, and then the fit, right? The fit is gonna be the intangibles that we have to try to measure, whether it's in a personal interview or it's an in depth assessment, pairing that to that or references. See, that's the That's the side that the AI can't take away from us. It's the references. It's calling people that work for that person or work with that person that knew them and trying to get that insight information, that inside scoop, and then making sure that you communicate that to the client because the client you know, they love to say not. And and the universe of candidates is shrinking while you're building this up. You've got candidates that aren't interested, you got candidates that are interested but not qualified, and then you've got your qualified and interested candidates. You got to shake that tree to get those guys. out there in front of them and then you have to have a logical way to explain to a senior level executive, a president, a CEO, that this person is your right person. So I used to use and I still do, I use a s I could call an executive scorecard where when we have comparatives, we have, you know, overarching scores or composite scores if you want to call them that. And then then an in depth write up of w what the person explained themselves as, an interview process, an assessment outlaw. You know, not no executive wants to read like a bi page psychological profile. They they need they need a paragraph. Yeah match. And you gotta you gotta basically I will say you gotta you gotta make your information to them spicy and straight.

speaker-1: Yeah, you send me one of those, I send back like a question mark or an exclamation I like I try to get down to punctuation. So I I totally get it. Does does the answer change as far as how you deal with it if you're say stabilizing a business, integrating an acquisition or building for the next stage of growth?

speaker-0: Yeah, private equity's a tough a tough a tough place because it's all about the growth, right? It's all about the bottom line. It's all about the valuation of a company that doesn't have a public evaluation. It's it's all the inside baseball that's happening between the CFO and the CEO and the private equity investors. So you you you you gotta have someone that's really, really resilient, really gonna take and understands the time frame and then understands what valuation means. You know, what where the Where is the value of the company? It's it's usually in the operation side if they're making money and they have profit margin and that's gonna be the price of the company when it sells, right? It's gonna be not the value of the of the top line, the revenue, it's gonna be the margin between operating profit and EBITDA.

speaker-1: Yeah, yeah, absolutely. How do you separate an executive who benefited from a strong business from one who can actually make the business better?

speaker-0: I say I say it's one, their personality, and two, it's gonna be their their track record, right? It's gonna be what they've done and faced in the past. That that that will give you a great indication. There's a there's there's job changing and then there's the I mentioned the personal interviews that you wanna do of people that can vouch for them or not vouch for them. I've had bad references on people before, affected the the outcome.

speaker-1: It's always amazing. Yeah, they give you the name and then they don't don't say the nicest things. What questions do you find get beyond the polished answer? Like which references do you want and how do you actually establish what the person attributed or accomplished?

speaker-0: I I to I do a three sixty reference, I call it I wanna know someone that he worked for, she worked for, you know, that that that that that was, you know, basically that person was accountable to. The next person would be a Power, a person that they have to share their their information with. Let's say if it's a COO role, you know, how about the CFO? Did they have a relationship with the CFO? What was that like? And then finally a subordinate, you know, someone that was a key player on their team.

speaker-1: A new CEO has a limited window to build that right team. How do you decide who can make the next stage and who needs support and where are the changes necessary?

speaker-0: Wow. One, after I place the CEO, I like to talk to him again three months in, say, what do you think? What do you think of your organization? Do you feel like you have any any holes? It's good business development, number one, because you know, we get another retained search. But two, it's just to say, Hey, we brought you in here to do a job. What do you think? Do you have the right people around you to get it done? The board's relying on you and you know, you gotta have the right people. So that that's not just an inditation for a search. That's just to listen to it, hear out and You know, propose something, bring someone in, maybe for someone that's not doing a a great job to give a second chance, like a like an executive coach, 'cause if it's personal or personality, you can you can you can hopefully coach that out of them. How do you Boy, you know, what b business is risk and and reducing reducing risk is I think a a earmark of a of of an A player, or at least understanding where the risk is and and mitigating that risk with their team. So, you know, y if you can if you can do that and and and make the kind of growth numbers that I just mentioned, you know, especially around EBITDA and profit margin, you're gonna get the job done. It regardless of your team. If they're doing that and and they understand what the the priorities are. I think the CEO is well supported.

speaker-1: You mentioned the ear marks. What do you hope or expect to see that makes you have confidence is gonna work?

speaker-0: Yeah, I I don't know if I'm gonna use the word earmark, but I I I think it's the the results, right? Everybody and accountability for what the results that you're driving. Program results with your big program like a like a like a missile program or a weapon program, you're being graded by your customer. And you know, ongoing business, the next big proposal, you gotta make sure that you're getting the results that the customer wants.

speaker-1: You know, once an executive says yes, what must the board and CEO to do to give that person a fair chance to succeed?

speaker-0: One, I think make sure that the goals are clear. Coming down, coming down. Look, the board doesn't run the company, okay? The board advises the CEO and the CEO runs the company. So y y you gotta make sure that that that that communication from the onset is clear because that gives the CEO, his team, the CFO, C O O, whoever whoever is actually, you know, on that that that that business team, that business. Boards don't run the company. They're they're they're advisory. There could be some step over sometimes. Boards kinda might get in there, but then that's time to relieve the CEO if you can't if you can't do it and you know, you might need a new CEO.

speaker-1: I talk about that a lot and have lived it. They really only have one job. They they got a a a a an employee of one and their job's to hire and fire the CEO, right? Sign up

speaker-0: Right. And the CEO's job is to make sure that he has the right person sitting behind them to succeed him. It's it really the CEO hire for a for a s for let's say a successful CEO transitioning out is to basically make sure that they got a person that the board feels is the right person sitting there.

speaker-1: Yeah, I I completely agree. So, yeah, we talked before about you being an aviator. What f what did flying teach you about making consequential decisions and with incomplete information? And where does that lesson apply in choosing ele executives?

speaker-0: Well, I was anti-submarine warfare pilot, right? So we we we could do day-night ASW problem solving, right? So th there's nothing more ambiguous than an ASW problem. Okay? Why? I always make the joke. Because the submarine goes underwater, the water covers them up and makes them hard to see. So you you end up with sensors and you end up with with with buoy patterns, you end up with other assets that you're working with on a on a on a a let's say a submarine problem. Where, you know, you're protecting the main target, the aircraft carrier, other targets around it. You gotta c you gotta you gotta basically think a little bit out of the box. You gotta put yourself maybe in the eyes of the subcommander, what they would do and where they would go, to kinda do the the nasty to my ship.

speaker-1: Yeah, it's a I was a navy guy myself, but I was swabbing decks and chipping paint, so yeah. So tell tell me about a moment that you changed your mind. What did you cross check and what should a CEO do with a dashboard and a story so they make sure that they agree.

speaker-0: I think the CEO and CFO have to work in conjunction because the data, right, about how the company is and and what's happening and the CFO having communications to his finance folks and you know in embedded in the divisions has has to be there. So I think the CEO CFO relationship has to be s airtight. It has to be airtight because that's that's gonna tell you where your dashboard is. Supply chain issues, all those kind of stuff should flow to the CE CFO. The COO if you have one, that's that's another person, but you know, you want them to be on the floor, you want them to know the problems. Everything comes in as a financial problem.

speaker-1: It sure does. You know, it would be remiss not to talk about AI as the big topic on everyone's today. You know, as AI makes all our answers seem more polished and easier to produce, what becomes harder to fake as a leader?

speaker-0: Yeah, I wrote an article about it. So I I looked at the birth of the CIAO, right? And we can look back twenty five years and you remember the birth of the CEO, right? The information age was coming. We were on, you know, client server systems, you know, and then all of a sudden it was going to the the the digitalization of the business, right? Well, we're moving to the cloud. So we can we have, you know, unlimited storage capability and data that we can keep. The CEO is gonna be different. The C AIO is going to be different, I should say. It's happening a lot faster. Basically, applying AI to your systems is going to create what I call the cognitive organization. And so when you've got a cognitive business, AI has to become infrastructure. And it should speed up your processes, but it isn't there to run the business. It's giving you real time information with, let's say, help. All right. Would you like to see yeah, when you when you when you say, hey, I want to look at something, it can get into it. You know, it's not a spread it could it could define a spreadsheet faster than you can. And it could point out the issues and it'd say, What do you want to do next? That's good because basically you're y it it it enables you to ask the questions that you might not have seen right away and it gets faster.

speaker-1: Yeah, Apa AI is definitely helping assess and and support leaders in many ways. What judgments and and impacts, you know, should the CEO make sure that they're owning?

speaker-0: I think the CEO role doesn't change. AI becomes a cognitive tool for the final decision making processes. It shouldn't be in command of the business. It shouldn't be pushing anything. It should be alerting you to factors that you might take too long to see. Whether that's a supply chain glitch, you know, we're gonna we're you know, we're not getting product for our for our product in the door fast enough, or it's a production issue. We're you know, we're taking too much time, we're not gonna make a delivery time. All those things could be summarized by AI. But it AI doesn't make the decision to fix it.

speaker-1: talked earlier about CIOs transitioning to C A IOs. When does the company decide they need that? What does that look like? And when does it need a better defined operating problem?

speaker-0: Yeah, so I broke that down almost the same way you'd break the CEO role down as a as a senior level recruiter. What what do you have? Well the first the first part of this phase, we're in it right now. It's called the builder phase. So the builder phase di is is a person that has good understanding of AI, might be, you know, an architect or might be somebody a little bit more technical, right? The second phase is the integration, right? So we're moving from a technology position to a position of how does it apply in our business, right? And the third phase is is the pure business person, the high level person that actually is what I would say a CEO, C A I O, in in effect, they're they're they're in the business side of it and they understand how the AI partners that they're that they're utilizing are actually helping them. So those are the three phases I I use in the C AIO development from where it is today. builder stage, where it's gonna be, the integration stage, and then where it finishes the business executive stage.

speaker-1: Interesting. A CEO listening suspects that their leadership team doesn't match the strategy where they're going. What should that CEO do this week besides call judge? Just here to help.

speaker-0: Yeah, I mean, look, we can work we can work very confidentially in the marketplace where, you know, we're not revealing anything. We're just talking to other executives, seeing if their timing's right, what do they want to do, give them a little insight to the the customer. I think that number one, CEOs have to as just like a coach, you know, they have to basically live with the players, right? Until they can work something out with their general manager, their CHRO to create a a a a talent improvement strategy. So it isn't going to be cured, you know, snap the fingers, we're going out to find new new people. So you got coach your people. You have to train, you know, make sure that they're getting the right they're going in the right direction. I mean if you're looking at an executive that has twenty years of experience, you know, you you it it might be something that you can fix. You know? How do you how do you how do you how do you make Jim or Mary, you know, get get with what I'm trying to, you know, get done. So that's the first stage. The next stage could be a talent scan where, hey, Joe, go find out who's out there, you know, and and and I'm not sure if I'm gonna hire anybody. So I just wanna see the marketplace. You know, who's available. Okay, that's a little bit longer, but that's also giving you time to coach up your players. For me, it just means that we're gonna probably talk every two weeks and we're gonna probably show you what we found out about different players in your i you know that you'd be interested in. Now if it comes down to saying, Hey, I gotta you know, Jim and Mary Jim and Mary's gotta go. I I think I'm gonna just go ahead and hire. Well, we just turn that that database and and those contacts into candidates.

speaker-1: When they're starting this process trying to figure out where to go, who should be in the room with them? Who should the CEO have in the room? And what evidence should they be collecting before they start?

speaker-0: Boy, I've I've worked with some really strong CHROs, right? I mean really strong business partners for the CEO. And and and and men or women, d it didn't matter. That's that strength right there at that level and having a CHRO that you know could come into let's say the board meeting or be there for you is almost the same as that CFO person that I said before. The CFO is your should be understand, you know, the heartbeat of the company. And CHRO has to be your chief talent officer.

speaker-1: Is there ever a situation where you'd make a recommendation to them to not go and hire somet someone yet?

speaker-0: Yeah, so g it's great being a consultant, right? 'Cause I don't have to make the decision. My job is to present alternatives. So it it is sometimes with more let's just say you know, more intimate relationships, long term relationships with some of the leaders, the CH th the the CEOs or you know, whoever the hiring manager is, we might get into those discussions. Those are probably d dinner discussions where they're just saying, What do you think of this? And an opinion's an opinion, you know. The the leader could take my opinion or not.

speaker-1: Typical CEO comes in, I know this is what I experienced. You have a thousand day to really build enterprise value. You talked about it earlier, the guy was there three years. What must be understood by the CEO by day thirty?

speaker-0: Well, I would start with he should know his whole team's names by their first names and and everybody that he should know because knowing names, pressing hands and telling people, you know, in the eye that you you you you you believe in and that you know, you're glad to be here and that we're gonna work this thing, we're gonna get to our goals. how you're gonna do that? I I I think that that part of it is the transition side, right? CEO transition. I know you're familiar with that. You do some coaching and executive coaching. So That part is there. Get to know your team. And in thirty days you should know your team. You might even know people downline of that team too. You know? You might know some lying people. You might know some other people. So knowing that and and understanding that and basically just getting your surroundings, you know. Say, right? situational awareness. That's a military term. You know, OODA, right? Be Oda Loop. that's another military term. So you know, you observe

speaker-1: Polly, you would know well, what's it observe, orientate? Decide. Action. Right. yeah. Yeah, there it see I remembered. Yeah. What would the what would they look differently at a day one hundred? So thirty days, know your team, where should they be at in a day one hundred? Three months at

speaker-0: Day one hundred should be you know, between day ninety and a hundred, let's just say you should have some some some indicators of whether your your your team's getting it. Are they there? Are they are they are they are they seeing the new or the direction that you're you're pointing the company in? And I think those things play out. I think the observation side, the evil HR person, you know, not not to say they're evil, but we know that's a a pretty interesting comment. But the C HRO should be informed, you know, of those of any performance pieces that the CEO is observing and that kind of gears them up, right?

speaker-1: And by day one thousand, what must the company be able to do repeatedly without depending on that CEO? Yeah.

speaker-0: Yeah, you know, there's there's the leadership quandary, right? The CEO is a figurehead and then there's the we couldn't live without our CEO, right? So so I think it's a combination of both. I think if you're if you've got a great team and and even if you have like weaker players, you you you you know, you can coach up. But the big thing is you should feel very comfortable that you have everything going in the right direction. The financial performance is there, the the the we'll just say the output. whatever your programs are, whatever your output is is happening on time, on delivery, at cost. And then lastly I think it's you know, what's your what's at that time I think you probably replace people, but you know, you're gonna have a natural attrition rate. So are you planning for those folks that are probably gonna leave you or you know, or you or you just knee jerking that, right? You gotta be a little bit ahead of the game.

speaker-1: JG, where should people go to learn more about you, your work and your books?

speaker-0: I'm I'm on LinkedIn, I've got like fifteen thousand followers. I say like eighty percent of those followers are in the airspace and defense. That's both the commercial and the defense side of the house. So it's not a it's it's a pretty good profile, I'd say. I try to contribute one or two things there, maybe a month. I'm not a I'm not a super tagger person. Books are on Amazon. The the good and evil in the age of simulation is a is a really four parts. we talk about evil in the sense of not Not disaster, not super villains, you know, or none of the biggest big the big evil things that we've seen in history, but kinda about corruption, deception, institutional corruption, and and I I I deal a little bit on the pneurology side because that's the study of evil and and it's goes back kind of to the religious roots. The study of the good, Plato, Aristotle, Catholic faith, all the things that surround the world, Hindu, Buddhism, the the Laozi, you know, any How do we is there a common denominator? Because this is a global world, right? We're all human. Is there common denominators there that that support what good potentially is? And what are the what are the distractors, right? Good is supported by other goods. That's the way it is. Evil is really the corruption of good. The age of simulation is upon us basically because we all experience life differently, especially online. You're you're gonna see different news. I'm gonna see different news. There's a lot of things out there that are there to distract you or basically we'll just call it misinformation or disinformation. It comes up, can you decipher that? Can you make a decision? The the last part of the book, just to kind of give it to you, is is the human agency. Everything is about the most powerful piece of human agency is the individual. The individual is the foundation of any society. Individuals, families, friends, you you start expanding it up, right? It and then it becomes community, it becomes city state, then it becomes nation. So at the foundation it's the individual.

speaker-1: Well Joe, thank you so much for sharing how you think about choosing leaders and the judgment it takes to help them succeed. All your links will be down in the show notes. So anyone that wants to get a hold of Joe, LinkedIn is probably a good one for me if you're looking for a great recruiter

speaker-0: D H R Global. They H R Global is another another profiles,

speaker-1: Don't forget them.

speaker-0: yeah.

speaker-1: We'll have we'll have that down there as well. So as this conversation was helpful to you, follow the Thousand Day CEO and share it with a leader building their next chapter. You can find more out about me and what's going on at BillCannedy.com. I'm Bill Canady, make everyday count. Thanks, Joe.

speaker-0: Thanks, Bill. You've been listening to the 1000-day CEO with Bill Canady. Follow the show for more decisive leadership, sustainable growth, and strategies that build enduring businesses. Until next time, make every day count.