Jim Collins, in his bestselling book Good to Great, demonstrates through massive research and comprehensive analysis that when it comes to CEO succes… - Ben Horowitz

Jim Collins, in his bestselling book Good to Great, demonstrates through massive research and comprehensive analysis that when it comes to CEO succession, internal candidates dramatically outperform external candidates. The core reason is knowledge. Knowledge of technology, prior decisions, culture, personnel, and more tends to be far more difficult to acquire than the skills required to manage a larger organization.

Jim Collins, in his bestselling book Good to Great,

Senior people pose several important challenges: They come with their own culture. They will bring the habits, the communication style, and values from the company they grew up in. It’s very unlikely these will match your environment exactly. They will know how to work the system. Because senior people come from larger environments, they usually develop the skills to navigate and be effective in those environments. These skills may seem political and unusual in your environment. You don’t know the job as well as they do. In fact, you are hiring them precisely because you don’t know how to do the job. So how do you hold them accountable for doing a good job?

Culture is not like a mission statement; you can’t just set it up and have it last forever. There’s a saying in the military that if you see something below standard and do nothing, then you’ve set a new standard.

When you ask your managers, “What is our culture like?” they’re likely to give you a managed answer that tells you what they think you want to hear and doesn’t hint at what they think you absolutely do not want to hear. That’s why they’re called managers.