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BP’s Tony Hayward is stepping down – about damn time. The “embattled” CEO is stepping down after showing the world that he may be the most ego-maniacal CEO of all time. This power house of brilliance lead a company who is responsible for arguably the worst man-caused nature based disaster in the history of the Earth and his response to all that was something about how he wants it all over so he can have his life back – you know jet setting around the world on his yacht and what not.
This douche bag was so disconnected from reality that instead of dealing with the situation in the Gulf of Mexico he decided that it was best to hand that situation off to the COO of BP so that he could go on yacht tour. What gets me the most is how much he acts slighted by the oil spill as if it is the rest of the world that did it to him. I would be totally disgraced if I was this guy’s son.
I believe this to be a case study in the dynamics of career success. The theory exists that native and crafted abilities are now less a deciding element in “getting ahead”. That the single most critical factor with promotions is based on a social network… “it’s not what you know, it’s who you know”. This type of social incest-based promotional schema GUARANTEES that we will suffer through more “Gulf Oil Spill” shocks in other industries around the world for the foreseeable future.
Leadership use to be a social science. Now, due to MBA programs attempting to be more “open-minded”, we’ve hollowed out this science into a convenient measure of “personality-defined leadership”. Said another way, any method is an appropriate method for leading corporations… it is all about the person’s personality doing the leading.
Pure Rubbish. Let us ponder the social factors involved with the fall of the Roman Empire. ‘Nuff said.
I agree. I believe that is one of the main things that freaks ScanJack out a bit – how much our own culture now mirrors that of Ancient Rome, and we know what happened to them.
In celebration of Ancient Rome, I now only drink my wine out of lead-ladened goblets.
The primary difference is building materials. Things will make prettier colors when we watch it all burn now than when Nero watched his go down.
I honestly think that the employees of companies contribute greater success/failure to the company than a CEO; the CEO gets all the pay, credit and blame though. I’m sure any one of us could do an equally good job of being a CEO of any of the major companies and be successful.