March 1, 2010 — As the economy begins to show signs of life, CEOs appear to be loosening up a bit, too, and priming for a return to growth, according to a new survey.
"Both the year-on-year movement and rank order of challenges suggest that CEOs' focus has moved from crisis reaction to preparations for recovery," said Jonathan Spector, CEO of The Conference Board, which conducted the survey. "Clearly, CEOs in the United States in particular are returning their focus to the road to growth. We're seeing a similar trend in the overall business questions we capture from our members."
Each year, The Conference Board CEO Challenge Survey asks hundreds of senior executives to identify and rate their most pressing concerns and publishes the results in the CEO Challenge Top 10 report.
Production of the 2008 report was stopped and the survey refielded in late 2008 in response to the exploding global financial crisis. Nearly 200 CEOs, chairmen and company presidents updated their responses, offering a unique "pre" and "post" insight: with no control over a turbulent global economy, CEOs retrained their sights onto "bread and butter" survival issues, while longer-term challenges, especially in talent management, were de- emphasized, according to The Conference Board.
"In that late 2008 survey, worries about global economic performance, business confidence, geofinancial instability and integrity of capital markets leapt up into CEOs' Top 10, and each has now dropped at least 10 places," said Linda Barrington, managing director of human capital at The Conference Board and one of the report's authors. "This year, all the challenges that jumped into the Top 10 in the crisis have now jumped back out."
According to survey results, the critical issues of excellence in execution and consistent execution of strategy by top management have consistently remained at the top of the list. But in the latest survey (which was fielded October-December 2009), such growth-oriented challenges as sustained and steady top-line growth, customer loyalty/retention and profit growth received higher ratings as "greatest concerns." Also moving up were corporate reputation for quality products/services and stimulating innovation/creativity/enabling entrepreneurship.
"CEOs' focus on these challenges suggests that recession-weary customers need to be wooed with significant new value to win back their business," Barrington said.
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