Gender fatigue is the secret lassitude that grips chief executives and directors when asked for the Nth time to discuss targets, quotas, audits and reports aimed at bringing more women into the boardroom.
Capello’s exit makes Hester look tough
A highly paid manager doing his duty for the nation resigns in a huff after his ultimate paymasters interfere with his right to manage. Fabio Capello, manager of the England football team, has done what Stephen Hester, chief executive of state-controlled Royal Bank of Scotland, declined to do.
Mr Hester – who spent most of Wednesday doing interviews to explain his decision to stay, despite the row over his bonus – has told the world that it would have been “indulgent” to resign. At the same time, he has sent a strong message to the government that if it wants to earn a return on the taxpayer’s £45bn forced investment in RBS, it should leave him alone.
To use Mr Hester’s terminology (and assuming that the England manager jumped and wasn’t pushed), by comparison, Mr Capello’s decision looks, frankly, indulgent. If the FT’s Simon Kuper is right, the resignation has less to do with the Football Association’s decision to override his view on whether John Terry should keep the England captaincy, and more to do with England’s poor prospects in the coming Euro 2012 tournament and the potential that it would put a blot on Mr Capello’s reputation.
Who wouldn’t want to be a venture capitalist right now? Investment bankers may be reviled and private equity executives hammered but Silicon Valley’s billionaire elite can do no wrong.
Reckitt’s brave new world
Rakesh Kapoor has been in charge of Reckitt Benckiser for less than a year but already he’s changed the world. Or, more accurately, he’s changed Reckitt’s view of the world, by merging its European and North American operations into one Amsterdam-based unit, and splitting the rest of the world into two reporting areas.
Like three ugly sisters, the new operations are called Ena, Rumea (Russia, Middle East, Africa) and Lapac (Latin America and Asia-Pacific). Stefan Wagstyl has pointed out on the FT beyondbrics blog that the clear message is that “emerging markets matter” for the multinational consumer goods group.
Reckitt’s change is more than a laborious redrafting of the corporate organigram. Pankaj Ghemawat wrote in World 3.0 that General Motors’ decision to make many of its non-US, non-European operations report to China was “a basic realignment of power”. The impact of Reckitt’s move to aim resources more directly at growing markets could be just as profound.
FT column: Big Pharma should learn from Hogwarts
Harry Potter and Viagra have more in common than you may imagine. They came to market within a year of each other in the late-1990s; they enjoyed enormous success; and what was a boon for the companies that produced and sold them could turn into a bane as their popularity fades and rivals emerge.
The unbearable vagueness of Zuckerberg
Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook’s founder, sets himself an admirable test in the company’s filing for an initial public offering – “that everyone who invests in Facebook understands what this mission means to us, how we make decisions and why we do the things we do.” Unfortunately, he then flunks it.
Like Larry Page and Sergey Brin, the founders of Google, which went public in 2004, Mr Zuckerberg has written a letter to shareholders to explain his approach to their new investors. While Google’s letter was brisk and open about how they intended to ignore short-term earnings targets, his is aspirational and vague.
“By focussing on our mission and building great services, we believe we will create the most value for our shareholders and partners over the long term . . . We don’t wake up in the morning with the primary goal of making money, but we understand that the best way to achieve our mission is to build a strong and valuable company,” Mr Zuckerberg writes.
Fred, title inflation and bad business baronets
The Los Angeles Times story about the humiliation of Fred Goodwin describes Britain as “a land where essentially feudal titles still carry great prestige”. True-ish. But I have to say that the UK doesn’t do business honours like it used to.
I’ve dug up this extract from the FT of January 2 1912 – and no, as you’ll find out if you follow that link, I’m not making this up:
NEW YEAR HONOURS AND THE CITY
A POPULAR SELECTION
WELL-MERITED RECOGNITION
The House having been closed yesterday, Throgmorton Street was unable to demonstrate its gratification at the New Year honours conferred on those more or less closely identified with Stock Exchange interests. It may be taken for granted, however, that the considerable number of baronetcies conferred upon leading representatives of City finance has given unqualified pleasure not only to the recipients but to the Metropolis as a whole.
Talk about title inflation. It’s worth nothing that this “well-merited recognition” was meted out by a Liberal government, and that those baronetcies were hereditary titles – allowing the descendants of dodgy business baronets to roam the land for generations.
Fred – you were born a century too late.
By James Mackintosh, investment editor
Arise, Mr Fred Goodwin. The banker who single-handedly brought down the British banking system has had his knighthood stripped away, and no one is sorry. Politicians, the public and the press are united in supporting the move against the former chief executive of Royal Bank of Scotland.
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John Gapper is an associate editor and the chief business commentator of the FT.
He has worked for the FT since 1987, covering labour relations, banking and the media. He is co-author, with Nicholas Denton, of All That Glitters, an account of the collapse of Barings in 1995.
Andrew Hill is an associate editor and the management editor of the FT. He is a former City editor, financial editor, comment and analysis editor, New York bureau chief, foreign news editor and correspondent in Brussels and Milan.
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