Leadership Management: Evaluating CEO Success in a Turbulent World

This essay analyzes the factors contributing to CEO success in today's turbulent world, emphasizing the balance between financial performance and Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) metrics. It explores the challenges of relying solely on financial metrics for long-term organizational success, including decreased employee motivation, lack of innovation, poor communication, and strained customer relationships. The essay also examines the difficulties leaders face in balancing financial metrics with ESG performance, such as knowledge gaps, increased costs, and conflicts of interest with shareholders. Ultimately, it argues that while financial performance remains crucial, integrating ESG considerations is essential for sustainable and comprehensive organizational success. The document is available on Desklib, a platform offering a variety of study resources for students.

Running head: LEADERSHIP MANAGEMENT
Leadership Management
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Introduction
The essay helps in the entire analysis of the different kinds of factors which are
responsible in the success of the CEOs in the different kinds of organizations. Furthermore, the
different kinds of challenges of focusing only on the financial metrics to the long term success of
the organization are required to be analyzed and identified effectively. Lastly, the different
challenges which are being faced by the leaders in balancing financial along with ESG
performance metrics are required to be identified as well. Proper discussion is required to be
done in which this will help the leaders in addressing the different challenges.
Evaluation of Success of CEOs in Turbulent World
In the present era, the CEOs are the leaders of the organizations who help in guiding the
employees in performing their best and gain competitive advantage. There are few major roles of
the leaders which are required to be identified in order to evaluate the success in the
organization. The major roles of the CEOs are to inspire trust with both competence and
character along with creating a vision for the organization as well. Moreover, the CEOs need to
execute the different kinds of strategies which will be helpful in the success of the entire
organization and coach the potential as to improve the performance of the team and solve
problems in an appropriate manner (Adner, 2016).
In the present turbulent world, there are different kinds of aspects which are required to
be considered in evaluating the performance of the different CEOs in various organizations. In
order to become an effective CEO, there are few aspects which will lead to success of the leaders
which are described as follows:

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Firstly, this is the duty of the CEOs to disruptive and pragmatic in nature which will help
in evaluating the success. The CEO is considered as the leader in corporate world who needs to
be pragmatic about the focus and pace of innovation which is required to be implemented in the
organization (Cashman, 2017).
Secondly, in order to be a successful CEO, the risk taking approach is necessary which
helps in analyzing that the leaders should take calculated risks and which are opportunistic
(Lester & Kezar, 2017). Moreover, the CEOs need to analyze the overall success of the
organization in different aspects which is inclusive of taking care of the financial aspects along
with providing motivation to the employees as this will increase the productivity of the
organization.
Thirdly, there should be the nature of continuous improvement process among the
leaders or CEO of the organization. This will help in ensuring that grit and perseverance do not
turn into self-delusion. The CEOs need to be strong enough which will counsel them towards
making continuous efforts to organization and themselves as well. The decisions are the fuel on
which the organizations run and this increases the productivity of the company if the decision
which has been taken is positive and is opportunistic in nature (Cashman, 2017).
Lastly, delivering the different tasks in a reliable manner is the other aspect which is
required to be considered while analyzing the success of the organization. The ability to reliably
produce the different kinds of positive results in the organization will help the organization along
with the employees in becoming highly potential and gaining huge competitive advantage as
well in the entire competitive kind of environment (Inyang & Ekeng-Ita, 2016).

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From the above factors, this can be considered that in order to become a successful CEO
in an organization, this is mandatory in nature that the person needs to constantly anticipate the
requirements of the organization and they should not allow any kind of shortage of resources to
cause the company to miss the different kinds of opportunities in the market (Goddard,
Hazelkorn& Vallance, 2016). Additionally, the CEOs are responsible for delivering the
performance in the organization; however, there can be different kinds of challenges which can
be faced by the leaders. In such cases, the CEOs need to consult with the management team to
understand and analyse the key metrics in each area as this will lead to superior performance in
the entire organization (De Paoli & Ropo, 2015).
For example- Sundar Pichai is one of the most successful CEOs at Google who is being
able to be successful as his approach was to take into consideration the different kind of
viewpoints of the employees and implement them. Furthermore, there is a nature of continuous
improvement in Sundar Pichai which has helped him in gaining competitive advantage and the
productivity of the firm has increased to a huge extent as well.
Challenges of Focusing on Financial Metrics for Long-Term Success of Organization
There are various kinds of challenges which can be faced by the different organizations
when they focus on the financial metrics for the long-term success of the organization. In
analyzing the long-term success of the company, there are various factors which are required to
be taken into consideration apart from financial metrics. As a leader of the organization, the
CEOs need to analyze the capability of the organization to achieve the different organizational
goals efficiently (Adner, 2016).

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Firstly, the main challenge will be lack of motivation among the different employees and
this can affect the morale of the employees working in the organization in a negative manner.
The employees are the assets of the company and they are required to be valued which will help
them in feeling motivated and perform their tasks. With the hard work and effort of the
employees, the financial aspects can be taken into consideration as when the employees will
work, and then the performance of the organization will be improved (Bras & DeMillo, 2017).
This can be solved with the implementation of Maslow’s theory; the needs of the
employees are required to be considered such as physiological needs along with safety and
security needs. These are the different kinds of aspects in the needs theory which will be mainly
focusing on the growth of the employees through career development and gain more
competitiveness in the entire market.
Secondly, there can be another challenge of lack of innovation is required to be
considered. With proper innovative capabilities of the employees and the leaders, there will be
huge productivity of the organization and the morale of the employees will be increased as well.
With the implementation of innovation, there will be implementation of ESG metrics which is
required to be considered for the success of the organization (Kickbusch, Cassels& Liu, 2016).
For instance- Tim Cook, the CEO of Apple is not successful like the other CEOs in the
market as the main approach of him is to gain profitability in the market. However, this has been
seen that there are ethical issues which have been faced by Apple due to Tim Cook has led to
different kinds of criticisms which led to loss of profitability of the company in a negative
manner. From the respective analysis, this can be considered that the motivation of the
employees plays a major role in gaining competitive advantage and become clearer in the
different types of approaches as well.

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Furthermore, the other challenge is that there would be no communication if the higher
authorities feel that only financial metrics are essential for the success of the firm. When there
will be no engagement among the different employees, this will lead to ineffectiveness in the
different tasks which are being performed in the organization and there will be financial loss as
well. The strategic focus plays a major role which will be getting affected when only the
financial metrics are taken into consideration (Spencer, 2016).
Lastly, the negativity in the customer relationships is the other major issue which is
being faced by the organizations in the present scenario. This has been noticed that in the present
era, the leaders should be transformational leaders in which the opinions of the employees are
required to be taken into consideration which will improve the overall efficiency of the
organization in a positive manner (Chin, Trimble & Garcia, 2017). Both employees and the
leaders should be innovative in their approaches to gain competitiveness or else there will be
huge failure of the organization (Price, Schneider& Quick, 2016).
Challenges Faced by Leaders in Balancing Financial and ESG Performance Metrics
There are various kinds of challenges which are being faced by the different leaders in
the current era along with the last 5 years as well in balancing the Environmental, Social and
Governance performance and financial metrics. Firstly, the main challenge which is being
faced by the CEOs is that the financial metrics is based on the different kinds of financial aspects
as profitability, increase in gross and net profit of the organization effectively (Madsen
&Mabokela, 2018).
Furthermore, on the other hand, in the ESG metrics, this serves as the indicator of quality
and this can be used as the risk management tool in the organization. According to the research

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by Vogel (2017), the ESG helps in maintaining a proper position in the competitive market by
maintaining proper focus on environmental, social and governance aspects. However, there are
few organizations, wherein the CEOs do not take ESG metrics into consideration (Bach,
Kaufman & Duckworth, 2015).
In order to balance the financial metrics and ESG metrics, there are various kinds of
issues which are being faced by the different leaders or the CEOs in the organization which is
inclusive of the following:
Environmental aspects are inclusive of determination of the change in climate along with
the emission of the carbon along with implementation of anti-carbon policies as well upon the
companies.
Social aspects are inclusive of relationship between the different suppliers, managers and
the other employees in the organization along with the different communities wherein the
organization in an operative manner.
Governance aspects is inclusive of the various audits, pays along with internal control
and shareholder rights which is required to be followed by the organization.
Firstly, there will be lack of knowledge management in balancing the ESG metrics and
financial metric as this can be seen that when the company is trying to handle the financial
aspects, there can be situation wherein there will be lack of expertise in the handling of ESG
metrics.
Secondly, there will addition of cost as while the company is indulging in the welfare of
the society and they are engaged in different kinds of CSR activities, this will reduce the entire
profitability of the company which will affect the overall productivity of the organization.

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Lastly, there can be conflict of interest with respect to the shareholders as the main
motive of the shareholders will be gaining profit and this will be helpful in managing the
different kinds of aspects such as gaining huge productivity. However, the conflict of interest
will arise when the company and shareholder are of different opinions and this will affect the
profitability.
In the recent turbulent world, the leaders need to consider the different kinds of ESG
metrics as this will help them in long term success of the organization. The ESG metrics helps in
the construction of the portfolio which will improve the overall performance of the organization
and this will be inclusive of the financial performance longevity as well. However, there are few
challenges which are being faced by the leaders in managing both the metrics in the present
scenario (Ward, 2016). The main issue which is being faced by the leaders is that the main focus
is on the financial performance of the organization and this leads to different kinds of risks which
affects the growth of the firm in negative manner.
The ESG metrics is designed in such a manner which provides the different employees
with measuring their current exposure to listed companies which will help in providing
sustainable impact solutions for the entire growth of the firm in this turbulent kind of
environment (Hopkins et al., 2016). In order to create and maintain balance between the two
metrics such as financial and ESG, there will be problem faced by the company as there are few
organizations which mainly focuses on generating profitability in the organization (Nissinen &
Laukkanen, 2018). Furthermore, the CEOs do not care about the morale of the investors or
employees working in the organization.
From the management perspective, this can be analyzed and identified that integration of
the ESG metrics and dimensions of the performance makes the organization more resilient in

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nature and this helps them in create a dynamic kind of business environment which is less
complex in nature as well. However, without the integration of the same, the managers or the
CEOs of the organization will be deprived of the same and this can cause huge issues in the
organization as this will lead to failure of the success of the organization (Vogel, 2017).
Reduction of Challenges Faced by Leaders in Organizations
There are different kinds of aspects which can be considered by the leaders in order to
reduce the different challenges in balancing the ESG and financial metrics in the organization.
This has been noticed that in the present scenario, there are different kinds of role of the
successful leader which is required to be adopted in order to gain competitive advantage in the
entire market. As a leader, the CEOs of the organizations need to be the representative of the
organization in which they should plan for the success of the overall organization and not the
personal goal (Vogel, 2017).
Proper integration of the different kinds of personal goals along with the organizational
goals is required to be analyzed and taken into consideration as well. As a successful leader, this
is the core responsibility of the CEO to take care and take the entire responsibility of the
different kinds of approaches which will be helpful in managing the different aspects in an
efficient manner. The appropriate kind of balance can be created between the ESG and financial
metrics by taking into consideration the different financial aspects of the company (Vogel,
2017).
With the appropriate kind of integration of the ESG metrics, this will be acting as the key
differentiator for the different organizations in competing to retain and attract long term capital
and this will be avoiding and reducing the different kinds of risks which are included in the

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business. With the implementation of the same, the financial aspects will be safeguarded and
there will be no such worries on gaining profitability in the entire competitive environment. The
relationship of the companies with their investors is directly related to the integration of the
different ESR practices which will be helpful for them in becoming more compatible in nature.
Furthermore, this can be difficult to do the entire valuation in financial terms, however
there is a simple kind of evidence that the different organizations perform well who has included
the ESG metrics in the different kinds of operations of the organization and which is being
performed by them as well. The CEOs of the organizations can increase the usage of the ESG
metrics over the financial metrics as the development of the ESG metrics helps in increasing the
number of the investors in the entire market which is competitive in nature. The standards related
to ESG are being incorporated in the business operations and strategies which will be helpful in
becoming more competitive and gain more competitive advantage in the market as well.
For instance- Jeff Bezos, the CEO of Amazon tried to include the ESG metrics in the
organization wherein the company tried to maintain proper relationship with the different
investors and this has helped them in increasing the overall growth of the firm in a positive
manner in comparison to the other competitors in the market. On the other hand, Tim Cook
mainly focused on the different financial approaches and there is lack of ESG metrics and this
has affected the growth of the firm few years ago as well.
Conclusion
Therefore, this can be concluded that there are various kinds of challenges which are
being faced by the different leaders along with the employees in the organizations. From the
entire analysis, this can be analyzed and identified that there are different kinds of aspects which

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are required to be taken into consideration which will help in maintaining the effectiveness and
importance. Moreover, this has been analyzed that in order to generate the success of the
organization, there will be inclusion of both financial and ESG performance metrics as well.
However, there were different challenges which were faced by the CEOs in the
organization in order to maintain balance between the two to improve the performance of the
organization in a positive manner. Furthermore, the different recommendations have been
provided which will help in improving the overall situation in a competitive and appropriate
manner. Moreover, with the help of the ESG metrics, there will be proper integration of the
different activities of the organizations with the investor of the company and there will be no
such inclusion of the potential risks in the organization as well.

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