WASHINGTON, Feb. 12 (UPI) -- Ever wonder what it's like to be a chief executive officer, to be in charge of thousands of jobs and millions of dollars?
If so, then go inside "The Mind of the CEO" (Perseus Publishing, 320 pages, $13.60 paper) by Jeffrey Garten, an in-depth look at how corporate leaders think and handle their business strategies.
Dean of the Yale Management School and BusinessWeek columnist, Garten interviewed 40 of the most prestigious CEOs who lead some of the world's most powerful organizations. "The Mind of the CEO" profiles these executives and highlights their hopes, aspirations and concerns.
The 40 CEOs interviewed appear to be focused on opportunities rather than threats of today's business emporium. And it remains their major challenges, as well as the challenges to be faced, will be using the Internet efficiently and effectively, effective managing in a global environment, and addressing social problems that may stand in the way of a successful business.
The CEO's responses to Garten's questions seem to suggest these leaders are pragmatic and non-ideological. Their responses are less formal and more relaxed, making the book easy to digest.
Some of the interviewees are renowned and included business tycoons such as Jack Welch of General Electric, C. Michael Armstrong of AT&T, AOL's Stephen Case, Hiroshi Okuda of Toyota, Intel's Andrew Grove and Roger Enrico of the PepsiCo.
Arranged by theme -- "The Next Internet Wars," "Being Global," etc. -- the book provides readers with a summary of important business issues. Together, the CEOs who make up the interviews represent an elite group in the business world -- their decisions have global implications.
For the most part, all the interviewees are concerned with finding and retaining talented employees. They also are concerned with the problems associated with doing business in a global economy in which so many countries are in varying states of sophistication and financial status, but yet remain important markets.
They also worry about an unstable financial system that is certain to be characterized by crisis. Finally, these leaders of industry talk about the risk associated with not achieving their goals. If they do not, they are aware the result will be lower stock prices, a negative impact on their company's reputation, and perhaps a loss of job.
As a group, they believe e-commerce is in the early stages of a business and societal revolution that will continue for many years to unfold in unpredictable ways.
Another question Garten poses concerns the role our most important business leaders should play in society. Garten devotes quite a bit of time on discussing how to expand the role of the CEO. He urges leaders to take more responsibility for creating a world in which everyone can prosper by controlling their ethnocentrism.
The only disappointment of this book is that a great deal of it is the author filling in his own interpretation and editorial comments between actual quotes from the CEOs. It does not always come across as the most objective piece of work and the book would have been better if it was a series of interviews.
After reading this book, I gained a better understanding of what problems CEOs face in their companies. They need to tackle the challenges of the globalization in a time of great economic change.
