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 COO.com
No matter what you do, there is a high probability that there is a web site or magazine dedicated to your profession unless you are a COO. A few issues ago, The Harvard Business Review noted the same thing. So why is it that a such an important role in growing organizations gets so little attention? And if there were a COO website or magazine, what would it look like?
Drawing on the quarter century of resources in our proprietary data base, Corporate Recruiters looked at over 150 position descriptions and resumes to find out.
One factor that came to the surface was the sheer uniqueness of the job description. Often the ‘heir apparent’ in a company, (but not always) the COO needs to have a skill set that balances that of the CEO. Often, in a manufacturing or electronics focused company, this person would have an engineering background. So should COO Magazine resemble a technical journal? Not so fast.
Services companies tend to have former project managers and development managers in the COO role. Software companies were most diverse of all, including individuals from both of the above categories as well as sales operations, channel management and finance.
There is one trend that seems to be moving across the board. With the increased focus on corporate governance and Sarbanes-Oxley compliance, many companies are seeking COO’s with backgrounds and qualifications in finance. Many recently anointed COO’s have come from the camp of the CFO’s.
Will this bring an increase in financial oversight and a decrease in the traditional role of merging vision and strategy with structure and execution? It’s too early to draw conclusions, but we may see smaller companies with larger executive teams where the new role of COO takes on some of the large portfolio of responsibilities traditionally owned by the CFO.
One thing is likely never to change, however. It has been said that entrepreneurs look for best actions, while COO’s focus on best practices – a dichotomy that will lead to interesting boardroom discussions well into the future.
By Tim Swanson, Corporate Recruiters Ltd. He can be contacted at tim@corporate.bc.ca
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