Dear C.E.O., all I want for Xmas is competance...

A man is stranded on a desert island and stumbles upon a magic lamp. He rubs it and a genie pops out granting him any one wish.

He immediately wishes for World Peace; no war, famine, hatred, poverty or evil in the world.

Genie say, "dude, I know I said any wish you want, but c'mon...isn't that a little over the top?"

He agrees and immediately changes his wish to the Jets winning the Super Bowl.

...to which the genie says, "...what was that wish about World Peace again?"

That joke reminds me of what it is to be a C.E.O. or any member of the C-suite today. It's an unforgiving job, where all the leader of a company wants are 3 simple wishes: business growth, competitive advantage/differentiation and customer intimacy. Instead, they have to settle for 30-second spots.

Well, hopefully these insights will help them with their quest.

I had the pleasure of contributing to a document championed by the fine folks over at ExactTarget, titled "Letters to the C-Suite," along with:

• Rohit Bhargava, Author of “Personality Not Included”
• Pete Blackshaw, Executive Vice President of Digital Strategic Services, Nielsen Online
• Hunter Boyle, Managing Editor, MarketingExperiments Journal
• Rex Briggs, Chief Executive Officer, Marketing Evolution and Author of "What Sticks"
• Ann Handley, Chief Content Officer, MarketingProfs
• Joseph Jaffe, President, crayon and Author of "Join the Conversation" (that would be me)
• Jeanne Jennings, Author of “The Email Marketing Kit”
• Aaron Kahlow, Founder of the Online Marketing Summit
• Kelly Mooney, President and Chief Experience Officer, Resource Interactive
• Jeanniey Mullen, CMO, Zinio and VIVmag, Founder of The Email Experience Council
• Andy Sernovitz, Chief Executive Officer, GasPedal and Author of "Word of Mouth Marketing"
• Stefan Tornquist, Research Director, MarketingSherpa Inc.
• Steve Yastrow, Author of “Brand Harmony”

My contribution is available right here for your reading pleasure (Download ExecAlert2_Letters_Jaffe) , however if you want the entire compendium of C-suite pearls of wisdom, you'll have to visit their site yourselves. Oh and while, you're there subscribe to their marketing insights newsletter or visit their blog...they're an incredible smart bunch of folk doing fine, fine work in the e-mail (and related areas) space.

Enjoy and would love your thoughts. What would you say to the C-suite if given the opportunity?