CEO Blogs

Seth Godin has a post up that says CEO’s probably shouldn’t blog. I disagree with him. I think CEOs should blog as a way to supplement the communication they do every day with their employees, customers, partners, and investors. Two really good examples of CEO blogs are Matt Blumberg’s blog and Steve Goldstein’s blog.

If you go read them, you’ll see that they are full of thoughts about each CEO’s business, their market, industry trends, and more. They have an opinion and are interesting reads. Put yourself in the shoes of an employee or a big customer and you can see the value of these blogs.

Seth says blogs work best when they exhibit the following characteristics, which he goes on to say are not standard characteristics of CEOs:

Candor
Urgency
Timeliness
Pithiness
Controversy

For a blog that is seeking a large audience, I think these characteristics are important, but not all blogs need a large audience to be worthwhile. CEO blogs can serve a smaller audience and serve an important purpose.

Plus, I think that great CEOs display Candor, Urgency, and Timeliness in spades. Pithiness and Controversy wouldn’t be on my wish list, but the first three certainly are.