What will the COO of the future look like?

The COO’s role has large­ly been to ensure that oper­a­tional process­es run smooth­ly and effi­cient­ly, estab­lish strat­e­gy for pro­duc­tiv­i­ty and per­for­mance and work with the C‑suite to set the cor­po­rate vision and cul­ture. But the Covid pan­dem­ic has changed every­thing. Organ­i­sa­tions are nav­i­gat­ing a new hybrid work­force, ongo­ing sup­ply chain dis­rup­tion, geopo­lit­i­cal uncer­tain­ty and shift­ing cus­tomer demands. 

In many cas­es it is the COO, rather than anoth­er mem­ber of the C‑suite, who is spear­head­ing oper­a­tional changes in the post-pan­dem­ic world. And they are well placed to do this. Cri­sis man­age­ment is the COO’s area of exper­tise, notes Abi­gail Vaugh­an, COO for HR and pay­roll spe­cial­ist Zel­lis. Resilience is now a pri­or­i­ty for build­ing organ­i­sa­tions back stronger.

“Changes to the work­place and the pace of busi­ness post-pan­dem­ic, togeth­er with ris­ing cus­tomer expec­ta­tions, require sta­mi­na, resilience and con­ta­gious pos­i­tiv­i­ty,” says Vaugh­an. “It feels like we’re awak­en­ing from hiber­na­tion. And as the COO you need to help wake peo­ple up as fast as pos­si­ble to avoid being left behind.”

But while COOs are tak­ing the lead in rebuild­ing their enter­pris­es, how does that trans­late to the new hybrid work­ing land­scape? Does the COO need to learn new skills for this evolv­ing envi­ron­ment?

Adaptability will be key

James Bradley is COO at facil­i­ties man­age­ment provider The Churchill Group. By its nature, Churchill has staff that work onsite and in loca­tions that vary from offices to trains, so he is well versed in the chal­lenges of deal­ing with a dis­parate work­force. He says inter­nal com­mu­ni­ca­tions are impor­tant when nav­i­gat­ing the man­age­ment of a dis­trib­uted work­force.

“Mean­ing­ful and effec­tive com­mu­ni­ca­tions are key to cul­tur­al cohe­sion across the busi­ness and ensur­ing that we’re all work­ing to the same goals,” he says.

Vaugh­an has also found she has to sync up more with oth­er teams in the com­pa­ny. “Long gone are the days when every depart­ment could pur­sue its own objec­tives and it would come togeth­er at some point. 

“To max­imise the impact of change, all areas of the com­pa­ny need to work togeth­er on the same things. Oth­er­wise, siloes and frus­tra­tions arise and not only do your own employ­ees become dis­en­gaged because it feels dif­fi­cult to get things done, but your cus­tomers become aware of it.”

More than ever, COOs must be adapt­able. Simon Nolan is senior part­ner at exec­u­tive search firm Page Exec­u­tive and says this means under­stand­ing and adopt­ing new tech­nolo­gies and the sup­ply chains that relate to their indus­try.

“The pace of change is unre­lent­ing. The mark of a suc­cess­ful COO is one who can move with the times and imple­ment new skills need­ed for their busi­ness,” he says.

Nolan says oper­a­tions in the dig­i­tal world have become more com­pli­cat­ed as cus­tomers expect to be served and attend­ed to in dif­fer­ent ways, usu­al­ly with a mul­ti­chan­nel approach to the busi­ness. “COOs need to man­age the expec­ta­tions of tech­nol­o­gy and infra­struc­ture against the com­mer­cial demands of the busi­ness. Find­ing that bal­ance can be chal­leng­ing because the role is evolv­ing.”

But could the COO evolve to the point of becom­ing extinct? Liz Par­nell, COO at Rack­space Tech­nol­o­gy, believes so.

“COOs tra­di­tion­al­ly focus on KPIs and met­rics, deliv­ery and rev­enue but much of that is already auto­mat­ed,” she notes. “Now it’s about peo­ple and under­stand­ing the needs of employ­ees as we nav­i­gate new hybrid-work­ing styles. To a great extent we are now ‘chief empa­thy offi­cers’. Peo­ple have always been a business’s most valu­able asset, but the abil­i­ty to lis­ten to and under­stand the needs of employ­ees has nev­er been more impor­tant.”

Par­nell says that COOs will need to use their intu­ition and emo­tion­al intel­li­gence for the busi­ness’ needs: to add val­ue in break­ing down inter­nal silos; inte­grate new busi­ness and under­stand their work­force. Unless they con­tin­ue to lis­ten to staff feed­back dur­ing the changes, trust will be bro­ken.

“The key skills required now are trans­paren­cy, hon­esty and empa­thy, and clar­i­ty in com­mu­ni­ca­tion and flex­i­bil­i­ty – a deci­sion made today may no longer be the right one in two months’ time. So, aware­ness and humil­i­ty to adapt are vital for this work­ing era,” she explains.

How will the COO role change in the future?

Par­nell sug­gests that while every organ­i­sa­tion is work­ing towards a bet­ter-defined post-pan­dem­ic real­i­ty, “the truth is that no one has this fig­ured out”. This, she says, is clear from the diver­si­ty of approach­es, “from Elon Musk expect­ing staff in the office full time, to oth­er com­pa­nies exper­i­ment­ing with a four-day work­ing week.

“The return to office will like­ly be slow and will rely on encour­age­ment. The chal­lenge will lie with mid­dle man­age­ment who will be imple­ment­ing behav­iour­al changes and it will be a great test of their lead­er­ship skills. 

“My advice to them is to lead by exam­ple, to be able to hon­est­ly and authen­ti­cal­ly feed back the ben­e­fits of the in-per­son, onsite expe­ri­ence.”

Opin­ions, though, are divid­ed as to what the future COO will look like – or whether they will exist at all.

Par­nell is adamant that the role – at least as we recog­nise it – is on its way out. “I don’t see the role of COO exist­ing in five to 10 years because of the cur­rent evo­lu­tion of the work­place,” she says. “We’ll see the role morph into empa­thy offi­cers who take the lead to advo­cate on behalf of their employ­ees, with being head of busi­ness inte­gra­tion to break down silos for the bet­ter­ment of an organisation’s future.” 

Vaugh­an says she doesn’t believe that every com­pa­ny needs a COO or that the role is need­ed all of the time. The role, she says, “usu­al­ly grows out of a spe­cif­ic need to ‘fix some­thing’ and as organ­i­sa­tions evolve and mature, the need for the role should be kept under review.”

But she adds that when it is need­ed, “what will remain true is that it will be a broad, mul­ti­fac­eted role, with respon­si­bil­i­ties spe­cif­ic to the con­text you’re work­ing in and require the role hold­er to be high­ly col­lab­o­ra­tive and able to adapt.”

But Nolan main­tains that the COO will retain its posi­tion as a cru­cial part of any senior lead­er­ship team, regard­less of a business’s size, indus­try or com­mer­cial inter­ests.

He says: “It is in the best inter­est of any com­pa­ny look­ing to be ahead of the curve to have a COO. The COO is the per­son who has to deliv­er on behalf of the cus­tomer and dri­ve suc­cess.”

5 tips for recruiting a COO

With the role chang­ing so exten­sive­ly, what should hir­ers look for in a COO? Dr Bec­ca Franssen, part­ner at inter­na­tion­al exec­u­tive search firm, Per­rett Laver, pin­points the new key ele­ments.