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Businesses and other organizations very often fall victim of the short sight, incompetency, and lack of guidance from business owners, executive management and directors. The idea here is to do something about this with special focus on family SME businesses in the middle-east What do you think ?
i believe this approach is needed in the middle east,unfortunatly family owned enterprises or businesses are not build the same way of open mindness larger structured companies are.
their start and success have been the results of positive general market direction,i was raised in a family business in amman-jordan,i started working with my father very early i believe i was10 years of age,and have spend valuable time in the market where many small businesses flourished.we were in the business of construction,industrial and agricultural equipment and machinery supply.the business still exists with my brothers as new owners.
after years of experience internationally ,going back and trying to coach and teach new market dynamics,growth opportunities,business analysis i have received reject soly bacause they all have a belief that they succeeded due to their own effort and winning strategies.if you meet second or third generation business owners you feel the close mindness and errogance that prevents them from aquiring much needed help and knowledge.
that doesn't mean there aren't any open minded business owners that are willing to listen,but again they were reluctant to change.
i would very much like to see small to medium business grow as the case in UAE and other countries.but the fact remains we need to educate more and start the process.
I agree that there van be many incompetent executives but you also need to have in mind the usual performance management systems which are mainly based on short term goals. I will just quote a piece from one of my articles which explain why senior executives show bad results or behave in this way:
... a short-term focus can have other negative consequences such as top management leading the company in a way that they reach the targets without taking care if that causes damages to the company on the long run. Focusing only on short-term goals and paying incentives for that will ultimately lead to such situation especially in present times where high fluctuation of the top management is very common. In fact the high fluctuation of the top management is a direct result of short-term goals and incentive schemes. That is why we have decisions to save on training budgets, new technology, research and development, human capital costs etc. in order to meet the annual profits or other annual goals. These decisions will help meet the annual targets but will damage the company on the long run resulting in loss of competitiveness and lack of response to changing environment.
Not only in the middle east, CEOs and other executives worldwide often need a mirror to see themselves. My experience is that at least75% of the CEOs need external coaches. I have done this to substantial effect with several senior people - it works, and it brings fantastic change in them, and for their subordinates.
