President’s Message – June 12th

“Father Time is undefeated.”

I first heard this quote from Charles Barkley, a true voice of a generation, while he was talking about Shaquille O’Neal toward the end of his long career. Never have truer words been spoken. He captures the one absolute truth we learn from history: Every leader, great or not, eventually loses their position of leadership … every single one. Not to be a downer, but the only questions are how and when.

This looming eventuality is one of the reasons I originally joined CFBC. When I first joined, I didn’t have a succession plan, and honestly, I didn’t have a clue where to begin. When I look back on my first few years, it’s terrifying to think of what I would have put my wife (zero business experience), my three kids (16, 14 and 13 at the time), and my employees (I was the only one with a college degree) through had the unthinkable happened. As unpleasant as it is to think about, they would have been left with an absolute mess.

As a result of my eight years in CFBC, I’m now pretty comfortable that things would be taken care of in the event of an untimely spaghetti truck. It didn’t happen overnight, but evolved through several CFBC channels: our general educational events, the shared learning and accountability with my Tau forum, and the expertise shared by all of our strategic partners. In my mind, if you haven’t fully developed and pressure tested a series of comprehensive succession plans (today’s spaghetti truck all the way through tomorrow’s riding off into the sunset) you haven’t really taken full advantage of CFBC.

With that in mind, I will be dedicating my last year on the CFBC Executive Committee as Chairman to the proposition that every CFBC member, young and old, can take stock of their situation and can have a full-fledged succession plan in place. It’s easier than you think.

Finally, I want to sincerely thank Gina Krusinski and Sean Hoffman…. Gina is stepping down on June 30 as the Chairwoman of CFBC and Sean will assume the role of President of the organization. I cannot express how generous Gina has been with her time, expertise, passion for learning, and availability of conference rooms. She has done a great job so please thank her the next time you see her at an event. Sean has also been a rock star in the Executive Committee and I’m excited to see him continue his great work in the coming two years.

Hope to see you all soon at an event.


Jeff Conner
Liners Direct 
CFBC President 2016-2017




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