Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by scott_w 54 days ago
You expect the CEO of a company to have the legal depth of knowledge AND knowledge of all their customers, contracts and SLAs to be able to wing a communication and not somehow trip over all of that? They also should understand every possible legal jurisdiction that could be affected? You realise even the head of their legal department (a HIGHLY competent lawyer) likely wouldn’t say there could do that without speaking to the key people in their team?

Should the CEO also bang out some dev estimates for the roadmap because, hey, they should be competent enough to do something like that. Why not submit the accounts for the year? How hard can it be, just reading a few lines off their Sage or Quickbooks accounts?
2 comments
scott_w 54 days ago
Let me be more clear on what I mean by “wing it,” because “having templates” doesn’t really cut it. Anyone can bang out a “we have a problem” template, so why does the CEO need to attach their name to it? Once you’re at the point of needing a CEO to communicate, you have a specific problem, with its own specific impacts that a single person can not be expected to have enough depth of knowledge in their brain to actually talk about without involving their domain experts, including legal, technical, whatever the situation needs.
link
Orygin 54 days ago
> can not be expected to have enough depth of knowledge in their brain to actually talk about

What is the use of a CEO if not to have enough depth of knowledge about the different aspects of running a business?

Like what? Poor little CEO that doesn't understand anything about the world and how to run a company. Seems like helplessness is expected at every stage.

link
scott_w 54 days ago
> What is the use of a CEO if not to have enough depth of knowledge about the different aspects of running a business?

Bit of a difference between “having depth of knowledge in their business” and “can speak off-the-cuff with the necessary accuracy to remain in compliance with every contract and legal jurisdiction their organisation is engaged in, without consulting the numerous domain experts they employ for just this purpose,” isn’t there.

Also, such a situation that requires the CEO’s direct attention has already gone FAR beyond your standard incidents where you can throw out a pre written statement. Do you want your organisation just cuffing it from the top down? Are you Elon Musk in disguise?

link
Orygin 54 days ago
What use is a CEO if they can't take the lead in times like this?

If they are unprepared frankly they suck as CEO and should be thrown out. If only competency was a requirement for these jobs...

link
hvb2 52 days ago
Take the lead couldn't be more different than act by themselves.

Take the lead, yes they should be able to as that's the job pretty much.

Act by themselves, sure they can make decisions in small cases. But on big things you hear everybody's input, weigh it, and only if needed, cast the deciding vote.

link
scott_w 54 days ago
That’s not what I said though, is it?
link