What does it take to effectively manage a growing company? How can a CEO delegate responsibilities while maintaining control of their vision?
A COO might be the missing piece in your company’s leadership puzzle. The Second in Command, a book by Cameron Herold, explores the vital partnership between CEOs and COOs, showing how this dynamic duo can transform business operations and accelerate growth.
Continue reading for our overview of the book The Second in Command.
The Second in Command Book Overview
As a CEO, it often feels impossible to manage and grow an entire company while getting the results you want. The Second in Command, a book by Cameron Herold, says that’s because it usually is. It’s unrealistic to expect a CEO to have the expertise to manage every area of their business—this is why they have COOs. A COO allows the CEO to focus on the things they’re best at and leave the other areas in safe hands. In his book, Herold discusses the crucial role a COO can have in building your company and explains how to hire and utilize one to take your business to the next level.
Cameron Herold, commonly known as “the CEO whisperer,” is a serial entrepreneur, business coach, and author. His career took off as the COO of 1-800-GOT-JUNK? which he took from a two-million-dollar company to a company worth over 100 million dollars in roughly six years. After his time at 1-800-GOT-JUNK?, Herold began coaching CEOs and founded the COO Alliance—a community and training network for COOs—and the Second in Command podcast. Herold is also a best-selling author of books like Double Double, Meetings Suck, Vivid Vision, and Free PR.
In this overview, we’ll discuss what a COO does, whether you need one, how to find one, how to implement them into your company, and how to know when it’s time to let them go.
What Is a COO?
Traditionally, the term COO means Chief Operating Officer. However, according to Herold, a COO doesn’t necessarily need to be in charge of operations. Instead, they should be your second-in-command who’s in charge of everything that you can’t be—either because you lack the expertise, don’t like it, or would be more impactful by focusing your attention elsewhere. Your COO should be your perfect puzzle piece—they should thrive in all the areas that you don’t so that together, you create a complete picture.
According to Herold, there are seven main types of COOs and six main roles that a COO performs.
Types of COOs
1. The executor: This COO focuses on details and short-term achievements while the CEO focuses on long-term goals and the bigger vision. Their primary role is to listen to the CEO’s vision and identify short-term goals, strategies, and actions to make that vision reality.
2. The change agent: This COO functions as a catalyst for change inside the organization—for example, they might be in charge of enacting a major culture change or kick-starting a growth phase for the company. They’re usually hired from outside the organization to bring in a fresh perspective.
3. The mentor: This COO is usually older and more experienced than the CEO, and their role is to serve as a teacher and help the CEO navigate new territory.
4. The other half: While all COOs are puzzle pieces, the primary role of this COO is to cover the CEO’s weak spots while balancing out and complementing their personality. This dynamic creates a highly intimate working and personal relationship between the COO and the CEO.
5. The partner: This COO often functions as the CEO’s counterpart in that they share equal responsibility and authority in the business.
6. The heir apparent: This COO’s role is to learn all about the business while the CEO vets them with the intent of naming them CEO when they retire.
7. The MVP: This COO is an internal hire who was promoted to COO because their work was crucial to the company’s continued success. Employees who are this valuable are often “poached” by other companies looking for COOs. This COO can often fill one or more of the above functions.
The Roles of COOs
When you hire a COO, you must determine which roles you need them to take on, and, by default, which roles you’ll abdicate. These are the most common roles that a COO may take on.
1. The COO explains the inner workings of the business to a CEO who focuses more on the technical side of things. For example, this COO will keep the CEO up to date on things like marketing, finance, or HR. This doesn’t require the COO to be an expert in all these areas, rather to have excellent communications skills and the ability to comprehend the basics of many different topics.
2. The COO questions the CEO and points out when things can be improved, aren’t working, or could fail.
3. The COO puts systems into place to achieve the vision and goals the CEO puts forth. This may require them to enforce new systems of accountability, designate roles to leaders, hire new department heads or specialists, and so on.
4. The COO seeks to create harmony within the company and ensures the company culture matches the CEO’s vision. This requires them to hire the right leaders and replace leaders who don’t fit the company. This also may require them to call leadership team meetings where everyone can discuss issues or have debates so everyone’s on the same page.
5. The COO designates tasks to others and provides them with the resources they need to learn and grow. The COO can’t specialize in every area of the business and accomplish every task that needs to get done, so knowing how to delegate tasks and grow people is crucial.
6. The COO serves as a model for the company culture at all times. They must uphold the company’s beliefs and values and behave how they want the rest of the company’s employees to behave.
What COO Do You Need?
Now that you know what a COO can do, you must determine what you need your COO to do. For a company to thrive, Herold says that leaders must only focus on the tasks that they’re best at. Therefore, hiring a COO requires you to determine what you’re best at and find a COO who’s best at the important things you’re not.
To do this, Herold recommends making a list of all the tasks you do in a month and sorting them into four categories: things you’re bad at, things you’re okay at, things you’re good at, and things you’re great at and love doing—your superpowers. Immediately delegate the things you’re bad and okay at—assign them to other leaders or an assistant, or find a way to automate them. The things that you’re good at but don’t love, which also tend to be higher-stakes tasks, are the ones that you’ll need a COO to manage. These high-stakes areas should be the COO’s superpowers.
Once you’ve figured out the responsibilities you need a COO to take on, determine what level of support you need. It’s possible that you may not need someone as serious as a COO—taking on a COO is a long-term commitment that will have a financial and cultural impact on your company. Herold says to consider the following factors:
1. If the tasks you would designate to a COO aren’t super high-stakes and you’re more looking to free up your time, can you hire an executive assistant instead?
2. Instead of a COO, can you hire department heads and designate your high-stakes tasks to them? For example, could you hire a head of finance or head of marketing?
3. If you don’t have that many high-stakes tasks to designate, can you hire a part-time COO who also works for other companies?
4. If your high-stakes tasks are temporary crises that will go away once solved, can you hire a consultant to help you work through them rather than a COO?
How to Find a COO
Once you’ve determined what kind of COO you need (if you need one), Herold says it’s time to start the process of finding one. To find a COO, you’ll need to create a clear and detailed job description, get the word out there to potential hires, and conduct in-depth interviews.
Create the Job Description
To write a job description that will attract the perfect COO, you’ll need to include the superpowers you want them to have, the business areas they’ll manage and the responsibilities they’ll have (consider the various COO types and roles), and the personality traits and values you want them to have.
When considering the personality traits and values of your COO, be sure to take into account your personality and your desired company culture. Since the COO will have a close relationship with you and you’ll spend a lot of time together, they should be someone who you can get along well with and who shares similar values and perspectives—they shouldn’t have personality traits that get on your nerves, for example.
Further, since the COO is the model of your company culture, you need to be sure they already align with the core values and behaviors of that culture before they apply for the job. According to Herold, it’s nearly impossible to change who someone is as a person, so you need to ensure they’re the person you need when you hire them and not afterward.
Finally, create a detailed future vision of your company and outline what the COO will need to accomplish within their first year of work. This outline will help the COO determine if they have the experience and abilities to meet your expectations, and you’ll use this outline to measure their success should they be hired. When creating your outline, consider things like your high-level goals, business strategies, financial goals, cultural goals, and so on.
Start the Search
Once you have a job description written up, Herold says you must start your search by first determining whether you want to hire from inside or outside of the company. Internal hires can be great because they already know the company and may already have a close relationship with you; however, only hire internally if this person is your perfect fit. If you try to make a COO fit who doesn’t perfectly align with everything you’re looking for, you’ll only cause more problems in the future.
When searching for an externally hired COO (which is most cases), you must spread the word about the open position across as many mediums as possible. Since they’re so valuable, the best people for the job are often hard to find—they’re usually already working for someone else and you’ll likely need to poach your COO from another company.
To reach these high-value people, post your job description on social sites like LinkedIn and Facebook and have your employees do the same. You can also post in any business groups you belong to or reach out to people directly through email. Another option is to work with an executive search firm—a recruitment service that will help you find a high-value person to fill the role you’re looking for in exchange for a fee.
Conduct Interviews
Once you find a few candidates that might fit the bill, Herold says you must interview them yourself to ensure they’re the right fit. In the first round of interviews, determine whether each candidate’s values and behaviors align with your personality and your desired company culture. If they don’t align on this level, there’s no point wasting your time with further interviews, as these aspects can’t be taught.
After narrowing down the candidate pool to about five people, conduct a second round of interviews to determine whether or not the candidates have the skills you need. Do they have the superpowers you’re looking for and the ability to accomplish the components of your outline? You’ll probably want to include department heads during this interview stage who can help you determine the candidates’ skills in the areas you’ve outlined but don’t have expertise in—for example, the financial head or the marketing head. You should also ask for references in this interview who can verify the candidate’s skills.
In the next interview, Herold recommends spending substantial time asking the candidate what each of their references would say regarding their alignment with the criteria on your job description. This will allow you to ask probing questions and get the best insight into the person’s true personality and abilities.
Once you’ve narrowed down your top choices, conduct thorough background checks. Call each one of the candidate’s references and ask them how well they think the candidate aligns with each of the criteria you’ve listed on your job description—especially their values. Press them to be completely honest, even about the bad things. By the time you finish your background check, you should entirely trust the person you chose to hire.
Integrate Your COO
Once you’ve hired the perfect COO, Herold says it’s time to integrate them into the company. This requires you to onboard them and foster your working and personal relationship with them.
Onboarding
Herold says the onboarding process should take roughly three months. Be sure to outline all the important benchmarks you want the COO to meet during this time—for example, meeting with each of the department heads individually, completing the standard employee training, speaking with customers, and so on.
In the first month of onboarding, the COO should simply observe you and the organization. They should start to meet the other leaders in the company, sit in on meetings, and observe how everything works and fits together.
In the second month, the COO should start to look for opportunities to change aspects of the business to achieve the criteria in your outline. This may include altering systems, strategies, and even people in the organization.
In the third month, the COO can finally start executing on some of the changes they’ve identified in month two. In doing so, they should map how they’ll conduct these changes and in what order to ensure things go smoothly and that they’re not taking on too much at once or causing unnecessary disruptions.
During the onboarding process, the COO and their direct reports should get well-acquainted with each other. To ensure clear communication and productive working relationships, the COO should learn about each person’s personality, communication styles, work history, and so on. In the same vein, the COO should also share this information about themselves with their reports.
Building Your Rapport
According to Herold, building a close relationship with your COO is just as important as the onboarding process—for the business to run as smoothly as possible, you and your COO should have an intimate understanding of each other and should share mutual trust. This will help you overcome issues and present a united front to others in the company. To do this, you must build not only a solid working relationship but an intimate friendship as well. Since your COO’s personality intentionally complements yours, this shouldn’t be too difficult.
To start off, you and your COO should discuss your backgrounds and histories—for example, hardships you’ve faced, accomplishments you’re proud of, your fears, your family life and childhood, and so on. You should also take personality tests and share your profiles with each other.
To further promote friendship between you and your COO, Herold recommends regularly meeting up outside of work just to hang out—this isn’t to talk about work, but to just have fun and get to know each other better.
When to Let Go
While hiring a COO is a long-term commitment, Herold says that, in most companies, there will come a time when the current COO is no longer a fit. People and companies are always growing and evolving, and it’s not guaranteed that your COO will still align with the vision you have for the company after a few years.
If your COO no longer shares your vision for the company, no longer feels passionate about the goal, or the type of COO and roles you need them to fill changes as your future vision evolves, it’s time to move on. Herold says you’ll know when this time comes because your COO will stop enjoying the work as much and will feel more overwhelmed and stressed by their duties.
