Our school system instilled the mentality that there are no losers and everybody wins just by participating. Well, this system is not sustainable when things get serious. Everybody does not win and if you do not perform, well sooner or later, your lousiness will catch up with you. This is exactly what we are seeing in the marketplace. High profile as well as average executives who had been flying under the radar are being called to the test. In a shrinking market, there will be losers, however how do we weed out the scapegoats in this case?
Some are celebrating the shakeout at GM and Chrysler. People seem to enjoy the government’s heavy hand on AIG and other institutions, but the concern is who will be replacing these? Who is willing to step up and risk their careers in this environment? History teaches us that when a solid regime is toppled (right or wrong), chaos follows. The communist regime in Russia and the Islamic extremism in Iran are good examples. I am not likening our system to these extremes but just removing people from their positions is not a good solution unless you have the replacement ready to go.
Remember how people hailed the toppling of Saddam, but we discovered later that the solution did not end there, that was barely the beginning. Well now, we see people hailing toppling of heads at corporate America, but do we have the right plan to implement the change. This situation reminds me of a discussion I had years ago with a young intern who truly believed that a two-month training would allow him to run a multi-billion dollar company with 14,000 employees. The reality is that it takes more than education, experience or charisma to be in the right job position and toppling people left and right is not a good way to resolve the problem.
Some are celebrating the shakeout at GM and Chrysler. People seem to enjoy the government’s heavy hand on AIG and other institutions, but the concern is who will be replacing these? Who is willing to step up and risk their careers in this environment? History teaches us that when a solid regime is toppled (right or wrong), chaos follows. The communist regime in Russia and the Islamic extremism in Iran are good examples. I am not likening our system to these extremes but just removing people from their positions is not a good solution unless you have the replacement ready to go.Remember how people hailed the toppling of Saddam, but we discovered later that the solution did not end there, that was barely the beginning. Well now, we see people hailing toppling of heads at corporate America, but do we have the right plan to implement the change. This situation reminds me of a discussion I had years ago with a young intern who truly believed that a two-month training would allow him to run a multi-billion dollar company with 14,000 employees. The reality is that it takes more than education, experience or charisma to be in the right job position and toppling people left and right is not a good way to resolve the problem.
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