January 28, 2025

Path to Chief Product Officer and Chief Human Resources Officer: business savviness

Business savviness is one of the top skills distinguishing a CPO and a CHRO from their junior colleagues. What can you do to acquire business acumen?

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When your job is to support the people in your entire organization—you need very special skills. But what about the skills that take you to the top of the HR career ladder? I analyzed dozens of LinkedIn profiles to figure out what makes CPOs and CHROs stand out among their junior peers:

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Business savviness
Global perspective
Change management and transformation

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These are so important that I’ve decided to do a series of articles and interviews to help you acquire these skills. This article covers business savviness.

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What is business savviness?

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Let’s start with what it is not. Before starting a business, I thought there was a set of “golden rules,” and if only I applied them, then I would be guaranteed to have a successful company. And partly, I was right. For example, everyone knows that when you have a business, you have to pay taxes every year. Or if you have customers, you need to make them happy. Then, there are certain marketing techniques you can try. But when you start (or run) a business, you realize that no “golden rule” will give you a precise map to success.

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Instead, you constantly ask yourself new questions that help you inch forward. My questions for my events platform Spaciously are, “How do people go about organizing team events? Where do they look for inspiration? What do they enter in the Google search bar?” No one can help me answer these questions but my clients.

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Business savviness means having just enough knowledge to ask questions like these. And then it’s all about experimenting with different ways to answer these questions. In short, if you think your leadership team has it all figured out, they don’t. They constantly ask questions, dig for relevant information, and manage the risks of new approaches. You can do it, too. You don’t have to have anything figured out. You just need to start asking questions, trying things, and making mistakes.

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With this, how do you become business-savvy?

A business school?

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One direct path is to go to a business school. In fact, I found a reputable executive education program from Wharton designed specifically for CHROs. I went to a business school, and I’m happy that I did. But there are pros and cons.

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Pros:

You build a great HR network. This is especially valuable in an industry with few opportunities to meet people in the same boat.
You will become more confident in your business abilities. You will never be lost in business conversations again.
Your leaders will get a signal that you should be on the CHRO/CPO track.

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Cons:

While it gives you good context, a business program will never replace real-life experience. Your newly learned frameworks will make your job look easy. Then you’ll get back to the real world only to discover that these frameworks can take you only 1% of the way.
The program is costly (the Wharton one is $20,000) and will take at least 9 months.

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Read books, watch Coursera

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Like business schools, books, and free courses will give you good context. But when facing real-world problems, you will still have to find your way out. That being said, here are my three business-related books that make for an entertaining read:

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The Sprint: a book on asking questions and working with your team and customers to answer them in one week
The Lean Startup: how to move quickly with any program you are running, not just a startup
Product-Led Growth: about removing friction from people adopting your product or initiative

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You may also enjoy the online entrepreneurship course from Wharton.

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Ask your teams

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You have one important thing going for you: you know your teams. Do you want to learn about sales? Ask your salesperson. Marketing? Ask someone from marketing! Your teams will happily talk to you and recommend resources, and you’ll build a stronger relationship with them. In return, offer to help them with their career development.

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Are you worried that you will suggest something a marketing team will reject? If you’re offering tactical help, it will always be welcome. What’s tactical help? Don’t say, “Well, it looks like you should run an email campaign.” Do say, “I know company X, and their customers are very similar to ours. Company X has increased their sales through a newsletter. Do you want me to connect you with the marketing manager of Company X?”

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Come to team meetings

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This is especially important when you work at a big company. To understand your business, you need to know both the C-Suite’s strategy and what each department is doing. Can you figure out what’s preventing each department from hitting its goals? Do they need more people, training, team-building?

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Chat with CHROs and CPOs

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Turn to a local CHRO or a CPO for help. If you’ve never asked a stranger for help, here is how to do it:

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Look for 1st- and 2nd-degree connections among CHROs and CPOs
Send a quick message, “I’m working on my career plan, and I would love to hear how you developed your career. Can I invite you for a coffee this week?”
Make sure to ask a few dozen people. That way, you’ll get to chat with a few.
Come prepared to tell your story and what you want to achieve.
Then just relax and listen.

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If you like the conversation, ask them to mentor you.

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The takeaway?

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Start with learning from people around you. When you lack context, ask them for help or look for resources elsewhere: mentors and Google. If you have business-related questions and need someone to talk to, message me at hanna@spaciously.io with the subject line, “Business.”

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