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At the company that Mr. Tesha and I grew up in, the founder was a very personable, completely non-pretentious guy. An ex-engineer, he still drove a Ford Pinto wagon and eventually upgraded all the way to an Escort when Ford put him on its Board of Directors. At the time, this guy's company probably employed 150K or so people. Mr. Tesha worked directly with this CEO several times.
Later, the founder was superseded by a fellow everyone knew as "GQ Bob"; your CEO sounds just like this second guy. The company was demolished shortly afterwards, thanks in large part to GQ Bob's efforts.
Nowadays, I work for myself, but Mr. Tesha once again works for a company with a mere mortal CEO. The CEO sits in a cube completely identical to Mr. T's and probably knows most of the thousand or so headquarters employees by name. Every half year or so, the company holds some sort of "all hands" fun day (for example, a picnic in the summer, a holiday party near Christmas) and a main point of entertainment is always the opportunity for everyone to have some sort of good- natured fun at the expense of senior management (silly minibike races, fastball radar gun competitions, ginger-bread house decorating races, disco dancing competitions, and the like) and this CEO is always a very happy participant in all the silliness as is his staff.
CEOs really set the tone for the company, for good or for bad.
Tesha
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