There’s a version of the CEO that shows up in movies a lot.
Confident. Quick with an answer. Never caught off guard. Always the smartest one in the room.
Real business owners know that person is a liability.
The Myth That’s Quietly Holding You Back
Somewhere along the way, a lot of leaders absorbed the idea that asking for help is a sign of weakness. That if you don’t know the answer, you shouldn’t be in charge.
That’s backwards.
The best CEOs I know are not encyclopedias. They’re not trying to be. They understand one thing very clearly:
You don’t need to know everything. You need to know where to go to find it.
That’s the actual job.
What Good CEOs Actually Do
They know their gaps.
They know which problems they can solve on their own, and they know which ones need someone else’s expertise, a different tool, or a conversation they haven’t had yet.
They’re not embarrassed by that. They’re organized about it.
Think about how differently those two approaches play out in real life.
CEO A gets a question they don’t know the answer to. They stall. They guess. They wait until they feel ready. They spend three hours trying to figure something out alone that someone else could have answered in ten minutes.
CEO B gets the same question. They say, “I don’t know, but I know who does.” They make a call. They get the answer. They move.
One of those people is building something. The other is just staying busy.
Being Organized About It Is the Real Skill
It’s not just about asking for help. It’s about building a network of people and resources you can actually rely on.
That means knowing:
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Who in your world has already solved this kind of problem
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Where the right information lives when you need it fast
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Which experts, tools, or partners are worth trusting
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When to bring someone in versus when to figure it out yourself
This is not passive. It takes intentionality.
The business owners who do this well treat their network like an asset. They maintain it. They invest in it. They’re not ashamed to use it.
The ones who don’t are constantly reinventing the wheel, alone, in a room full of people who could help.
Why This Matters More Right Now
The pace of business is not slowing down.
AI is changing how marketing works. Automation is changing how teams operate. The rules for getting found online are shifting. Customer expectations keep climbing.
No one person can stay ahead of all of it by themselves.
That is not a failure of leadership. That is just reality.
The leaders who thrive right now are the ones who stay humble enough to keep learning and organized enough to know where to go when they need answers.
They’re building something bigger than what one person could hold in their head.
Make Resourcefulness the Standard
Here’s the reframe worth holding onto:
The goal is not to know everything. The goal is to never let not knowing something slow you down.
That requires two habits.
First, stay organized. Know your resources. Know your people. Build a short list of go-to experts in the areas that matter most to your business. Keep it current.
Second, make asking the default. Not the last resort after you’ve spent two hours spinning your wheels. The first move.
The time you waste trying to figure something out alone is time you could have spent on the work that actually moves the needle.
If AI, marketing, or getting your business more visible online is an area where you’re not sure where to start, that’s exactly what I focus on.
You don’t have to sort it out alone. Just reach out.
That’s the whole job, really. Know what you know. Know what you don’t. Know where to go.
Then go.
Larry Fischer is the CEO of Internet Media Now. The Wake Up Call publishes daily for business owners who are done sleepwalking.