Dear Ms. Vu,
During my MBA programs, I constantly think about how important to have a right leadership team in workplace. So I identified the roles of CEO through my research. I would like to share with you and your folks in Anphabe. I welcome your comments and everyone on how you see the role of CEO in your organization. Ms. Vu, please give me some advices.

I have been struggling with many questions when I study MBA such as:
How should the CEO of an organization invest his/her time so that it best meets the needs of the organization?
How the CEO handles day to day operations?
How can the CEO be the most useful, and get out of the mistake of everyone else so the CEO can succeed?
What are the responsibilities as the CEO?
What value does CEO bring to the organization?
How the CEO builds/ maintains the culture he/she want through the organization’s growth?
How the CEO keeps his/her hand on the daily activities of the company without micro-managing?
Is this really what CEO wants to be doing?
I hope that Ms. Vu can help me with some answer for these questions.

What is the CEO?
I believe the definition of CEO depends on whether business is a corporation or not, whether it has BODs or not. In a corporation, the CEO is the 1 position that is primarily job to carry out the strategic plans and policies as established by BODs. In this case, CEO reports to the BODs. In a non-corporation, the CEO is a position that sets the direction and oversees the operations of an organization.

Roles of the CEO

Leadership: CEO makes the organization effective capable of doing the right things. CEO acts as a Leader in the organization which he/she would advises the BODs, promotes the organization change related to organization mission, supports motivation of employees in organization products, programs, and operations.

Management: CEO makes the organization efficient capable of doing the things right. CEO is a top manager; oversees operations of organization; implements plans; manages HR department, Financial Department and physical resources

Entrepreneurship: CEO makes the organization innovative capable of doing the new things. CEO provides visionary action; ensures organization staffs and BODs have up-to-date information; looks to the future for change opportunities.

Strategist: This role is to set the future direction of the company, and determine where company’s future profit margins are coming from. What customer problems will CEO solves? As Strategist, CEO always needs to be working to answer these questions.

Ambassador: The CEO interfaces between BODs and employees; between organization and public. As CEO, he/she needs to visit customers/clients often. Not making sales calls; simply visiting with. As Ambassador, CEO needs to provide a continuous stream of value and build his/her trust levels. CEO should work to be seen as a “trusted advisor” and help customers/clients solve their most challenging problems.

Inventor: As CEO, he/she should be the Chief Innovator. He/she prepares the answers for this question: What new products and services should we consider based on our customer needs? This does not mean that CEO has to come up with all of solutions. Instead, it means that he/she must create a culture in workplace that facilitates creativity, out-of-box thinking, and innovation. In addition, CEO should establish processes to evaluate new ideas, and ready for those are viable, enable a path to development or implement.

Coach: CEO should be out there closely interacting with his/her team and functioning as Chief Education Officer. CEO must be evaluating and creating avenues to develop people in company. CEO provides informative sessions on topics such as “Where is our industry going?”, “The financial model of our company: how we make money and what you can do about it?” or other topics that reflect the CEO’s responsibilities.

Investor: All CEOs must be good balance sheet managers; he/she should spend more time understanding the balance sheet- even if they have a financial team.

Student: CEO must engage in continuous professional development to learn best practices to bring back to the workplace. CEO must develop expectations for his/her key leaders so that they too have a commitment to professional development. CEO needs to ask them, “What are you going to learn that will help you become a better leader?” CEO also needs to help them engage in learning opportunities to achieve this.
The CEO can have more roles than these but so far there are the basic roles. I can list more responsibility of CEO but it would be too long. I definitely foresee the success and failures that occur in an organization fall on the shoulder of the CEO. Someday in the future, these roles I prepare today would immensely help me to shift from management to leadership, and minimize the growing pains in my career. I believe that it is often difficult to realize when and how we need to get out our own way to continue on the path of success and growth.