Chief executive officer

A propos the cult of personality that attends all large organisations, the chief executive officer gets referred to at all times by only his Christian name — so “Lloyd”, “Bob”, “Chuck”, or “Jamie” — and is immune from the cynicism (which, in any other dimension, would be total) on the part of those — that is everyone, however much any of them might deny it — who hanker after advancement in the firm.

The CEO is thus afforded Hero of the Soviet Union, First Class status — often he will be awarded it by himself — and his pronouncements, however banal, hackneyed or foolish, will be quietly celebrated across the breadth of the organisation as “best in class”. Until his ouster, whereupon he will acquire the status of Trotsky, Snowball, Emmanuel Goldstein and so on.

Until then, whatever the CEO wants, he gets, however flagrantly it tramples on practical traditions, carefully-wrought operating models, or simple precepts of common sense. The conflicted look on the physog of the head of compliance as she rumbustiously insists tanks roll over a thoughtful policy framework she herself spent years designing, because of an offhand remark at the end of a Management Committee meeting, is a sight to savour.

It is important to separate the wheat of definitively dumb initiatives actually originating with the CEO, to whose beat all must immediately march, from the chaff of crappy deals a salesperson has tried to ram through by taking his boss’s name in vain, of course.

The apocryphal Goldman story

There is a story that a titan at Goldman sufficiently important to the firmament that he was known to all by only his familiar Christian name (let’s call him “Bob”) once had occasion to call a Goldman trading desk, at the time equipped with only a multi-line dealer board.

A voice — youthful, lacking the tell-tale timbre of age and experience — picked up and, as on a trading desk one does, said:

Trader: Goldman. (This is a statement. there is no inquiry, no rising inflection of curiousness. It's a statement.)

Bob: Yeah, can I get Jerry? (Now, when you are known to all by your Christian name you don’t bother with formalities. But nor, for that matter, do traders.)

Trader: He’s off the desk.

~click~

Now Bob might not bother with formalities, but he rather thinks he’s entitled to them. No message, even? Perhaps this young man didn’t realise to whom he was speaking. Bob calls back.

Trader: Goldman.

Bob: Look, it’s Bob here. Can I get Jerry?

Trader: I just told you he’s off the desk.

~click~

This will not do. Bob, having dispensed with any doubt he may have been benefiting this young fellow with, calls back a final time.

Trader: Goldman.

Bob: Now, listen to me, son. I just called to ask for Jerry

Trader: I listened. And I told you: he’s off the desk.

Bob (exploding): DO YOU KNOW WHO I AM?!

Trader: Yes. You’re Bob. You’re the executive chairman of the firm.

Bob: Right.

Trader: Bob, do you know who I am?

Bob: Ahh, ... no?

Trader: Right.

~click~

See also

• The CEO wants this to happen
• Make America Great Again
• Unjustified enrichment

Dramatis personae: CEO | CFO | Client | Employees: Divers · Excuse pre-loaders · Survivors · Contractors · The Muppet Show | Middle management: COO · Consultant · MBA | Controllers: Financial reporting | Risk | Credit | Operations | IT | Legal: GC · Inhouse counsel · Docs unit · Litigator · Tax lawyer · US attorney Lawyer | Front office: Trading | Structuring | Sales |