Eric Falkenstein has posted a useful guide to climbing the corporate ladder; if you’re not interested in politics, simply ignore the references to Barack Obama and concentrate on such phrases as “this is the key subtlety to the empty suit strategy, you need some camouflage”.
3 thoughts on “How to climb the corporate ladder”
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This article reminds me of a very talented employee I had who was in the midst of a very rough week. He had just discovered and fessed up to a mistake he had made and was pretty upset. He was being taken to task by a couple of his peers and came to me to apologize, clearly his confidence had taken a hit but he was a great employee. I pointed out to him that people who take on many challenges, make tough decisions that others don’t want to make are bound to occasionally make mistakes. I told him that I would much rather have an employee like him who works hard, than another who won’t make a tough decision and finds ways to avoid challenges. It still amazes me how many empty suits rise to the top.
My current boss has the view ‘nobody ever got fired buying IBM’. 2000 years on and still sheep everywhere. Unfortunately in this ‘age of perception’ this attitude is the norm. Personally I like to speak out and do the right thing. At first it appears that this is the hard choice but you soon learn that the empty suits are in fact empty for a reason – they have no idea. You just have to make sure that you know what you’re doing, a rare skill in today’s world.
Speaking of Empty Suits, I have a photo taken in the Sculpture Garden in Woodside, CA, of George and Laura. Too bad I cant enclose it in this comment.