A fool and his money
The making of a leader
Bernard Hollowood
I was recycling a few Eurodollars the other day when my attention was drawn to an advertisement for ILP or International Leadership Promotions. That is not the real name of the outfit, but it is near enough and the mild evasion of the truth should enable me to avoid the tiresome litigation that might otherwise be prompted by people claiming to recognise themselves in what follows.
"ILP." said the ad, "believes that industry is not making maximum use of its leadership resources. Our courses enable management to identify genuine executive timber and to reject material containing hidden flaws." Interested parties were invited to contact "our Mr Wilbraham Otis" at an office in Cheapside and it was the work of less than twenty minutes to contact this gentleman by phone (after reversing the charge) and make an appointment ...
"A major aspect of our work in Britain," said Mr Otis, "is screening people who would otherwise be disqualified in the promotion ratrace. Many companies are so afraid of accusations of nepotism that they cold-shoulder the sons and grandsons — not to mention the daughters and granddaughters — of the founder as a matter of principle, yet these people are usually ideally equipped to provide the brains, confidence and élan so sorely , needed.
"We had a case not long ago in which a man of thirty-five, Tom Poddick, son of Joshua Poddick, had been an office boy from the age of twenty-two after a double first in Economics at Oxford and the Harvard Business School. He had been held back by sheer prejudice. He was quite brilliant, with an IQ of 155, had captained Oxford at soccer, reached the final of the European outdoor chess championship and written a book, The Macro-economics of Stoneware Production, which was recognised as the textbook on the subject.
"He was ambitious and longed to succeed his deceased sire, but whenever he applied for promotion the appointments committee always found some ridiculous rea• son for turning him down and keeping him kicking his heels as an errand boy and secretary of the works sports club. The fact that he rode a bicycle told against him, so did his refusal to belong to a London club. Senior executives considered him boring because he turned a deaf ear to their best scatological jokes, and were deeply suspicious of his fluent command of French, German and Japanese. "Even when he passed our leadership test cum laude they dished his application for promotion with the parrot cry 'we mustn't be accused of nepotism'. We advised him to change his name by deed poll to Smith and he is now
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