“CEOs are the heads of firms in more ways than one. They lead the firm by directing the attention of others in the organization toward thoughts and actions that ensure the survival and growth of the firm. . . . Firms can particularly benefit from CEOs who focus on the future.”
–Manjit S.Yadav, Jaideep C. Prabhu, & Rajesh K. Chandy

If you’d like to be sure that your company leads the competition in innovation, talk about it. That’s the message of a new study by Manjit S.Yadav, Jaideep C. Prabhu, and Rajesh K. Chandy.

The study looked at letters to shareholders in the annual reports of on-line banking companies over eight years. It found that the amount of time CEOs spent talking about the future of their companies correlated strongly with more innovation and faster adoption of new technologies. In other words, CEOs who spend time paying attention to the future get better results in the future.

That may seem obvious to you, but apparently not everyone gets it. One study showed that most CEOs spend less than 3% of their time thinking about the future. That’s three percent. That’s not much more than an hour a week!

Of course, you’re busy. You’ve got a thousand things to think about now. Things that have to be done today. Things that will have an immediate impact on your organization’s performance. Of course that’s where your time has to be spent.

But wait. If you’re going to be a leader, you’ve got to know where you want to go. Maybe somebody else can take over worry about where you are now.

Think about it. Talk about it. It looks like it might make a big difference.