Good Results Can Hide A Lot

Alex McDonald - Founder, Execura International.

September 2026.

Modern Bridge Structure.

You don't always see the gaps in a leadership team until things get tough.

Revenue is growing, customers are happy and the numbers look good. There isn't an obvious reason to question the team.

In some of my conversations with CEOs this year, they've talked about getting pulled back into daily decisions, dealing with difficult customers they shouldn’t need to be dealing with, or spending more time in parts of the business they thought they had stepped away from.

That can go on for a surprisingly long time.

Growth Can Hide A Lot

As a company grows, the jobs around the leadership table change. Someone who was very good at running a smaller business or division may still be very good at their job, but five years later, the job itself may be different.

There are bigger customers, larger teams and more money at risk. The decisions get bigger too.  

I've heard this particularly in industrial and engineering services businesses. Roles that were mainly operational five years ago now involve much more commercial decision-making.

The CEO Can Keep Things Working

A strong CEO can cover gaps elsewhere in the business for years, and the business can continue to perform.

One question I'm asking:  

​Where do you still get pulled back into the business more than you'd like?

Sometimes it is simply a CEO who likes being close to the detail. Sometimes it is because they don't yet trust someone else to make the call. They are very different situations.

It Often Takes A Change To Expose It

Margin pressure has come up a lot in my conversations this year. When margins get tighter, or a major customer is lost, weaknesses that were manageable when the business was doing well can become much easier to see.

The change hasn't necessarily created the problem. It's made it harder to hide.

A business can be making good money while the CEO is still stepping in too often, an executive is struggling with a bigger role, or there isn't anyone ready to take over from a key person.

Succession Starts Before Someone Leaves

One CEO of an engineering services business I spoke to recently doesn't want to wait for an executive to leave before looking for the next person.  

He wants the future executive already working in the company.

If you wait until someone leaves, you're already under pressure to replace them. If you start earlier, you have time to see what people can actually do.

Good results tell you that the business is doing well. They don't necessarily tell you how much the CEO is holding together personally or whether someone who is doing a good job today can handle a much bigger job in the future

A few questions I have been asking: 

Where do you still get pulled back into the business more than you'd like?

Where does the business rely too much on one or two people?

Which leadership roles have changed the most as the business has grown?

If the market got tough, where would you worry first?

If you're working through some of these questions yourself, get in touch -  alex@execurainternational.com