世界上没有CEO超人

    有几种方式能让CEO们在明星效应中保持清醒的头脑。薪酬就是其中的一种。沃德曼在提交给同行评审期刊的一篇研究论文中指出，在美国，CEO的薪酬如果与公司内部薪酬次高者较为接近，往往比那些薪酬差距大的CEO更加谦逊。他表示，这样的管理团队往往更高效。“（他们）积极探索，学习新知识，同时又充分利用现有知识。”

    明星CEO还可以通过缩小与雇员间的物理距离来保持谦逊。阿尔弗莱德·斯隆就是一个例子，他曾在1923年至1956年间担任通用汽车（General Motors）CEO。“斯隆是第一位明星CEO，“传记《斯隆规则》（Sloan Rules）的作者戴维·法伯在接受芝加哥大学（University of Chicago）出版社的采访时表示。斯隆当然相信，他命中注定要成就一番事业。但他也和员工在一线一起携手工作。1992年出版的《管理未来》（Managing for the Future）一书中，管理学者彼得·德鲁克写到，斯隆每3个月就会离开总部，前往美国各地的经销商店内作一名普通的销售员。弗斯特表示，看到这位CEO兜售别克（Buick）车可能会让员工认为他很有人情味。

    完善的接班计划也能够削弱明星对公司的负面影响。“如果你相信自己是超人，就别考虑谁来接替你了，“弗斯特说。深知个人局限性的CEO们会在任职初期就考虑接班人的问题。谦逊的CEO们也知道选择一位与自己强项不同的接班人有哪些益处。从良性角度看，公司在不同的历史时期需要从领导者身上获得不同的特质。“问题不是哪个时期的领袖伟大，”弗斯特说。“问题是谁来领导？目标是什么？”

    这才是核心。一旦明星CEO们将个人成功视为命中注定，将自己担任CEO职位视为必然的选择，认为个人所有决定都合情合理，危险就在逼近。杰出的领袖或许喜欢走红毯，这没什么，只要他们知道，自己作为CEO一职的最适合人选只是相对状态——在某一特定时刻相对于组织内其他人而言。

    而且，名声（无论如何名满天下）并不等于不会犯错。“没有超人，”弗斯特说。“不存在这样的人。每个人都在妥协。”

    译者：杨智

    There are a couple of ways to keep a clear head in the face of CEO stardom. Pay is one. In a study of Waldman's that he is currently submitting to peer-reviewed journals, he found that in the United States, CEOs with salaries close to those of their next top managers tend to be more humble than CEOs at companies with large pay gaps. Those management teams tend to be more effective, he says. "[They] engage in exploration and new learning and also exploit existing knowledge quite well."

    Star CEOs can also stay humble by creating less physical distance between themselves and employees. One example is Alfred Sloan, who was CEO of General Motors from 1923 to 1956. "Sloan was the first celebrity CEO," said David Farber, author of the biography Sloan Rules, in an interview with the University of Chicago Press. Sloan certainly believed he was destined for greatness. But he also worked with employees in the field. In a 1992 book called Managing for the Future, management scholar Peter Drucker wrote that Sloan would leave headquarters every three months and work openly as a salesman at GM (GM) dealerships across the U.S. Seeing the CEO hawking Buicks probably humanized him for his employees, First suggests.

    Solid succession planning can also temper star power. "If you believe that you are superman, there's no need to wonder who is going to fill your shoes," First says. CEOs with a good grip on their limitations will think about a successor early on in their tenure. Humble CEOs can also see the benefits of choosing a successor who has different strengths. It takes a degree of healthy perspective to see that companies need different things from leaders at different times in their history. "The question is not great leadership period," First says,  "it's always great leadership by whom for what."

    And there is the crux. Star CEOs grow dangerous when they see their success as destiny, their place at the head of the pack as the only path possible, rendering all of their choices justified. The best leaders might enjoy the red carpet, that's fine, as long as they understand that being the best fit for the CEO job is a relative status -- relative to the needs of the rest of the people in an organization at a specific moment in time.

    And fame, no matter how great it may feel, does not equal infallibility. "There is no superman," First says. "Those people are not there. Everybody's making tradeoffs."