Articles—Issue 17, December 2006 Back to Article Index Is Time On Your Side? I was on a bike ride the other day with a good friend who is a seasoned executive. He has owned a company and run several others. For the last 2 years, he has been CEO of a start-up company that does not yet have any revenue. Recently, however, they finished a product that has good potential and they have another in the pipeline. He has secured meetings with some industry heavyweights and any one deal could be worth millions of dollars.   There were numerous times in the last two years that the financial backers of my friend could have gotten frustrated and thrown in the towel or brought in another person to try to get to market. Fortunately, this company is backed by mature people with an understanding of time as a key element of success.   High expectations are great, but realism is often overlooked in business. Just because a fund would like to 10x their money in 2 years does not mean that most businesses should be able to do it. There is all that “stuff” like the market, competition, lack of resources, strategy, etc. that can get in the way. If you can't plan it, it won't likely happen. As a current book title says, "Hope is not a Strategy".   There is speculation that in today’s world, Jack Welch would have been fired before he had time to reach the great heights that he did. There is certainly a good argument for making leadership changes quickly and decisively when necessary; lack of intellect or ethics might certainly put someone in that category. I wonder, however, how many talented executives were thrown out before they had time to build core competency and fine tune the strategy?   I hope that you had a prosperous year and are feeling confident in your direction for 2007! (c)2006 by Tood Ordal. You are welcome to share this informational article with others. Todd Ordal is a business consultant helping executives struggling with execution. Prior to founding the consulting firm Applied Strategy LLC, Todd spent over 25 years in management and executive roles such as President and CEO. You can contact Todd at todd@appliedstrategy.info