A Chairman is not there to run the company

The Chairman's job is to run the board. The CEO's job is to run the company. The Chairman will be heavily involved in hiring/firing, appraising, setting success metrics and so on for the CEO. The Chairman almost never uses direct authority and in fact has little in terms of day to day running of the club - it's more a matter of influence.

For example, if there was a suspicion that NCFC's corporate comms wasn't entirely up to snuff - and I've said before that I don't think it is - the Chairman would not wade in with size elevens doing Alan Sugar impressions. Rather, he would ask the CEO to present on communication strategy and operation to the next board meeting, and make the CEO responsible for delivering objectives around communications. A rather less confrontational approach would be to involve the comms people directly in announcing his own appointment so he can get to know the people a bit and maybe suggest things on the way.

A good Chairman operates almost entirely by influence, not by direct authority. His job is to make sure that the board operates well, is well informed and advised, works through consensus, has its performance externally appraised every so often (every three years is standard in a plc), sets strategy for the organisation and so on.

Posted By: Old Man, Dec 28, 11:42:56