There’s No Young CEOs!
Yes there are!Here is one of them...
Posted on 05/24/2019 6:57:26 AM PDT by Liberty7732
The “old, white men” problem has been rolling down crooked rails for a long time now, driven by progressive feminist radicals. In newsrooms in the 1990s, I regularly heard how a City Council or County Commission or group of Legislators were just a bunch of “old, white men” invariably from female reporters.
“White males” have long been the target of the left and their media allies in the now fully formed and mainstreamed identity politics of diversity. And now the last element has been demonstrated clearly in no less a publication than the Wall Street Journal.
WSJ Headline: “CEOs Under 50 Are a Rare Find in the S&P 500”
(Common sense: Right, because it takes a long time and experience and proof over decades to show you can run a major company.)
Drophead: “The number of S&P 500 CEOs in their 40s has declined in the past decade, leaving Gen X relatively underrepresented among corporate leaders”
(Common sense: Gen X always will be “underrepresented” because they are a particularly small generation. Duh. To the bigger point, the Greatest Generation and Gen Z are also “underrepresented.” So what? Who gives a flip?)
It’s hard to get past the vacuous headline and drophead, but doing so reveals even more of the head-shaking, worship of PC diversity, as though it is some sort of magical wand and inalienable right rolled into one. Why the Journal is doing this story is a mystery.
From the story:
At America’s largest companies, chief executives under 50 are still a relative rarity. A Wall Street Journal analysis of S&P 500 companies that filed corporate proxy statements by May 1 shows 28 of 493 CEOs, or 6%, are under 50.
While corporate-governance experts have pushed companies to appoint more diverse — and, at times, younger — directors to boards, the leaders of big companies largely remain baby boomers. The median age of a chief executive in the S&P 500 is 58, the Journal analysis of proxy data from MyLogIQ shows.
Perhaps “corporate-governance experts” — which sounds a lot like the grievance police — didn’t take math in school. The baby boomer generation is the largest generation in the nation’s history and, and, it is in its peak earning and leadership years. Of course it will be “overrepresented” (a clever little term used to determine future diversity grievance remonstrances.) Baby boomers will also be overrepresented on Social Security and Medicare. They have also been overrepresented among people paying taxes.
Do these reporters actually understand the job that a CEO does? Perhaps they picture them sitting in big corner offices, drinking cognac and smoking stogies, going for three-hour lunches and just making a few decisions with a wave of big, fat, white male fingers while everyone else actually does the work.
They sure don’t seem to understand that to be a good CEO at a mammoth firm, you need years of experience climbing the ladder so that you will understand all the rungs of the ladder and understand how to operate a giant organization. And, with few exceptions, that only happens with time. Lots of time. And lots and lots of hours and sacrifice.
Oddly enough, nearly everyone quoted in the story understands this.
For instance, here:
Many corporations pick older CEOs because those executives are seen as battle-tested, while younger executives are still considered a bit of a risk, said Charles Elson, director of the Weinberg Center for Corporate Governance at the University of Delaware.
“There is something to be said for managerial experience, and you gain that through a long time of putting in the hours,” Mr. Elson said.
And again here:
Executives in fast-changing fields like real estate say there can be value in having seen multiple economic cycles. Joseph Margolis, the 58-year-old chief executive of Extra Space Storage Inc., compares running a company with the 10,000 hours of mastery popularized by Malcolm Gladwell, author of the book “Outliers,” who suggests that those who excel in their fields typically put in that amount of practice.
“It’s a big bet to choose a CEO, and there’s a lot at stake,” Mr. Margolis said. “It’s frequently an easier choice to pick someone who’s had a little more experience.”
So where is this coming from? Why is it a big deal that most CEOs are over 50, which makes all the sense in the world? The Journal spells it out:
Any change in the ranks of CEOs would be prompted by corporate boards, because directors select who sits in the corner office. Organizations like the California State Teachers’ Retirement Systems (which invests billions and acts as activist investors) are pushing companies to bring directors with fresh perspective to boards. Still, the job requirements of a CEO are different than those of a director, and it “takes time to get to the C-level,” said Aeisha Mastagni, a portfolio manager at Calstrs.
And there it is.
Of course there are always the leftist activists to stir things up and used diversity as a cudgel. One, among many in this case, is the California teachers’ retirement system, which is an arm of the state of California. California, you may recall, passed a law requiring publicly held companies based in California to have at least one woman on their boards of directors by the end of 2019. By the end of July 2021, companies must have at least two women on boards of five members and at least three women on boards with six or more.
Surely they will require minorities next. And eventually, there will be age requirements, too.
So it all connects. Diversity is king. Merit is meh. Old white males…well, they’re problematic.
White males are the only group that it’s OK to be prejudiced against. In fact, it’s virtuous to be a bigot with regard to white males.
Since people have a need to take out their frustrations against someone else, white males are becoming the target of grievance all over the world.
I’m so thankful for the Second Amendment. We all know where this is going.
Lord of the Flies.
Here is one of them...
Yeah, time to let teenagers run the world while they still know everything.
Logan’s Run, Business Version.
lol!
It’s not an entry-level position.
And that makes sense. Being the head of a major corporation requires experience and time put in
Speaking of diversity, shouldn’t brothels be forced to hire a more diverse workforce? Old, multi-gender, anorexic challenged, etc.?
Same with media anchors. Where are the ugly ones?
Thanks for posting this reality:
“Yeah, time to let teenagers run the world while they still know everything.”
LOL!
So let’s throw out the pesky age requirement in the Constitution so AOC can get the Dumbocrat nomination for 2020. Idiocracy here we come.
...Diversity is an anti-religion, and anti-ideology, a nepotism which promotes everything except one's own family.
Diversity therefore equals the destruction of any and all religions and of all positive ideologies.
Because Diversity can only be destructive: whatever IS is insufficiently or inexactly diverse.
Whatever IS must therefore be destroyed in order to make it MORE Diverse.
And there is no conceivable or measurable end to it. Yesterday's Diversity is today's intolerable lack of Diversity.
Diversity is the destruction of Good; and it is the destruction of all types of Good - however defined. All are chewed up and spat out by Diversity.
Diversity is the promotion of chaos by the destruction of Good; and then there-naming of chaos as Good.
:) yes, my 20 year old daughter knows everything under the sun. :)
I did too, at 20. What with the Internet, and all, I’m sure she’s much brighter than I was.
We need more 90 year old prostitutes, too.
Yes Cory Booker effectively killed his campain with that statement he made yesterday. Can’t remember what it was right now. Oh wait, was it creating an office of abortion rights? That will never fly in America.
Well, Steve Jobs was chairman of NeXT at the age of 30, but he still needed more seasoning to be able to be a successful CEO for Apple.
Hey everybody else: you think you can do a better job, have at it. You’re going to miss us though. After all, we’re the ONLY ones who EVER fought against human slavery. You’re going to wonder what happened.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.