Wolfgang Koester, CEO & Co-founder, FiREapps

It has been my experience that the most important factor in a CEO’s success is whether he or she is willing and able to get down in the trenches with employees. Like the coach who is still out on the field with the team. There is an adage that great leaders don’t ask others to do things they are not willing to do themselves. Great CEOs don’t lead from the sidelines; they are still in the game.

Over two decades as a CEO, including at FiREapps, a company I co-founded in 2000, I have found that ‘being the coach who still plays’ ultimately comes down to three fundamentals: