Discussion: View Thread

>
>
>anyone heard of The Future of Leadership, by White, Hodgson and Crainer?
>
>Anyone know of any successful companies with poor leaders?
>
>kg.

Karen,
I can think of a few: GM under Durant, GM under Smith, for that matter,
Exxon (remember the Valdez and the company's response?), Ford under
Henry Sr. in the 20s, Coors under Joeseph Coors, some would argue GE under
Welsh, Apple under Scully. These are just the ones that come to mind off
the top of my head.

I would also draw everyone's attention to the Jan 13 Business Week cover
story - it doesn't say anything about leadership!

Regards,
Dave

On Mon, 10 Mar 1997, KAREN GILBERT wrote:

> >
> >
> >anyone heard of The Future of Leadership, by White, Hodgson and Crainer?
> >
> >Anyone know of any successful companies with poor leaders?
> >
> >kg.
>

Karen,
I'm back. Let me see if I can respond to your questions below
Dave

On Fri, 14 Mar 1997, KAREN GILBERT wrote:

>
>
> Durant was a good leader.
How so? His overexpansion bankrupted the company, the courts legally
removed him as CEO for five years, and it was only through the money and
leadership of the DuPonts' that GM is even around today. And when he came
back in 1916, he darn near did again!

What did J Coors do poorly?
Other than alientating the entire Hispanic community and organized labor,
not much.
Scully mainly
> speculated with chips; a reasonably risky move agreed. But what did he
> accomplish before and after?

Scully was brought into bring some management experience to a company that
had outgrown its charasmatic leadership style to deal with the realities
of the market place. Scully and Jobs bumped heads because Steve wanted to
continually add more bell and whistles to the product while Scully wanted
to get it out the door to consumers before they lost interest. The tension
between the management preferences of Scully and the 'seat of the pants'
leadership types remaining at Apple is why he finally left, and perhaps,
just perhaps, one reason the company probably won't be around in 5 years.

> Also, is anyone claiming that GM, Exxon, Ford and GE
are successful
> companies? It can be argued that if one invests enough $ elsewhere, one
> can cover a LOT of mistakes.

But where did it get the money to invest? I'll wager that the millions of
stockholders in these companies think they're darn successful despite what
those of us in our academic ivory towers think.

> Gates might be worth a few (17) billion, but the justice dept can
> lien all that if they find as I think they will, that he was never
> justified in selling defective products as he ADMITS he does.
>
> just being able to finance court costs will not keep him away from
> justice. I admire his innovation as I admire Job's
> tenacity, but their firms hurt as many people as they help.

Wow, I'm afraid I'll have to ask for some empirical evidence to support
that contention! We probably wouldn't be having this electronic
conversation without them.

Regards,
Dave

Using your logic; would you call Lever Bros?? (whoever--tombacco-- it was that admitted
it poisoned people and then declared bankruptcy)
>
>Karen,
>I'm back. Let me see if I can respond to your questions below
>Dave
>
>On Fri, 14 Mar 1997, KAREN GILBERT wrote:
>
>>
>>
>> Durant was a good leader.
>How so? His overexpansion bankrupted the company, the courts legally
>removed him as CEO for five years, and it was only through the money and
>leadership of the DuPonts' that GM is even around today. And when he came
>back in 1916, he darn near did again!
>
> What did J Coors do poorly?
>Other than alientating the entire Hispanic community and organized labor,
>not much.
> Scully mainly
>> speculated with chips; a reasonably risky move agreed. But what did he
>> accomplish before and after?
>
>Scully was brought into bring some management experience to a company that
>had outgrown its charasmatic leadership style to deal with the realities
>of the market place. Scully and Jobs bumped heads because Steve wanted to
>continually add more bell and whistles to the product while Scully wanted
>to get it out the door to consumers before they lost interest. The tension
>between the management preferences of Scully and the 'seat of the pants'
>leadership types remaining at Apple is why he finally left, and perhaps,
>just perhaps, one reason the company probably won't be around in 5 years.
>
> > Also, is anyone claiming that GM, Exxon, Ford and GE
>are successful
>> companies? It can be argued that if one invests enough $ elsewhere, one
>> can cover a LOT of mistakes.
>
>But where did it get the money to invest? I'll wager that the millions of
>stockholders in these companies think they're darn successful despite what
>those of us in our academic ivory towers think.
>
>> Gates might be worth a few (17) billion, but the justice dept can
>> lien all that if they find as I think they will, that he was never
>> justified in selling defective products as he ADMITS he does.
>>
>> just being able to finance court costs will not keep him away from
>> justice. I admire his innovation as I admire Job's
>> tenacity, but their firms hurt as many people as they help.
>
>Wow, I'm afraid I'll have to ask for some empirical evidence to support
>that contention! We probably wouldn't be having this electronic
>conversation without them.
>
>Regards,
>Dave
>
>