The Pyramid Climbers

224 Pages·1963·0.886 MB·English

by  Vance Packard

THE

PYRAMID
C L I M B E R S

BY VANCE PACKARD

LONGMANS
LONGMANS, GREEN AND CO LTD
48 Grosvenor Street. London, W1

Associated companies, branches and representatives
throughout the world

© 1962 by Vance Packard
This edition first published 1963

Printed in Great Britain by
Lowe and Brydone (Printers) Ltd., London
To those in the business world whose generosity and
cheerful candor contributed so much to this exploration.
Acknowledgments

I am indebted to a great many people who took time from busy
schedules to share with me the benefit of their experience in assessing
and observing modern executives. A few cannot be identified, either
because of their positions or because of the nature of their
contributions. And a complete listing of the other people to whom I
became indebted in the course of this exploration would fill a number
of pages. I do wish, however, particularly to express my gratitude to
the following executives, management consultants, executive-search
specialists, behavioral scientists, appraisal specialists, and other
authorities on executive life:
Dr. Chris Argyris, Frederick G. Atkinson, Dr. Jerome C. Beam,
Harold Bixler, Lawrence Bloomgarden, Sid Boyden, Dr. Leland P.
Bradford, Albert Brown, Carter Burgess, Frank Canny, Dr. James N.
Farr, George Fry, Dr. Frederick J. Gaudet, John L. Handy, Ed
Hergenrather, William A. Hertan, Wardwell Howell, Dr. Eugene E.
Jennings, Dr. Harry Levinson, Robert Lounsbury, Dr. Robert N.
McMurry, Dr. John R. Martin, Robert F. Moore, Dr. Charles A. Myers,
Johnson O'Connor, Edward Reynolds, Charles D. Scribner, Everett
Smith, Roger Sonnabend, Lyle M. Spencer, Harold Stieglitz, Dr. Lewis
B. Ward, King Whitney, Jr., S. Vincent Wilking, John H. Williams,
Robert V. L. Wright. It is safe to assume that some of these people will
not concur with all of the thoughts advanced in this book.
I am especially indebted to nine of the above who were among the
dozen knowledgeable people who read this book in manuscript. All
offered valuable criticisms and suggestions.
My indebtedness extends also to friends outside the business world
who offered criticism from the layman's point of view. These included
Jane and Edward Eager, Kay and John Tebbel, Audrey and William
Roos, Audrey and Lester Cooper, and that sharpest of critics, my wife
Virginia. And finally I wish to thank Marion Fuller, Ann Bridgeman,
Judith Gilman, and Marion Harding for their help in the final stages of
preparing the manuscript.

VANCE PACKARD

New Canaan, Connecticut
September 2, 1962
Contents

PART I
MEN AGAINST THE MODERN PYRAMIDS

1. The Bitch-Goddess Raises Her Demands 3
2. The Pyramids and the Climbers 17

PART II
SCREENING, GROOMING, PRUNING

3. Some Types That Seldom Survive 29
4. Inspecting the Serious Prospects 41
5. The Wife: Distraction, Detraction, or Asset? 56
6. The Searchers and Snatchers 66
7. The Earmarking Process 76

PART III
THE WELL-PACKAGED EXECUTIVE

8. The Executive Look 95
9. Four Rules of Behavior for Survival 110
10. The Hazard of Mismating Man and Company 119
11. The Dilemma of Shifting Personality Requirements 132
12. The Search for Ideal Types 140
13. Seven Abilities That Seem to Count Greatly 155
14. The Inner World of the Top-Level Executive 172

PART IV
STRATEGIES AND INCENTIVES

15. Dead Ends and Favored Routes 183
16. The Maneuvers of the Power Players 194
17. The Problem of Being the Right Age 212
18. The Six-Figure Incomes and Other Lures at the Top 222

PART V
HAZARDS AND HARASSMENTS

19. The Worst Kinds of Places 233
20. Private Strains: The Executive As Lover, Father, Neighbor 242
21. When Stress Becomes Distress 257

PART VI
IMPLICATIONS AND POSSIBLE HAPPIER COURSES

22. The Bland New Leaders 267
23. Some Large Questions About Executive Assessment Techniques 276
24. Efforts to Develop More Leaders of Breadth 286
25. Experiments in Rediscovering the Individual 296
Notes 314
Suggested Reading in Specific Areas 319
Index 329
If a man reaches the top, he is not
going to tell you how he really got there.

—A senior executive of a very large U.S. corporation
PART ONE
MEN AGAINST THE MODERN PYRAMIDS
1
THE BITCH-GODDESS RAISES HER DEMANDS

Success—"the bitch-goddess, Success" in William James's
phrase—demands strange sacrifices from those who worship
her.—Aldous Huxley

We are about to enter a veiled and curious world. The object of this
exploration is to bring back relevant information about the breed of
people who climb modern pyramids.
Members of this breed are the hustling, well-packaged executives
who pitch their camps on ever higher ledges of the pyramids of
business power. They devote their adult lives to assaulting the slippery,
crevice-ridden slopes of the pyramids in the hope of arriving at a peak,
or at least a ledge near a peak. They learn the secret lore of negotiating
difficult passages. They sharpen some very special traits, such as
maze-brightness, which help them survive and advance.
Their desire is to be touched by Success, the goddess who stands
guard on the mist-covered peaks. Success permits only a few select
climbers to enter her cloud clubs. She has been known to be both
featherheaded and ruthless in her choices. She keeps changing the
requirements she expects of a climber as he progresses toward her
realm. Lately she has become much more exacting in what she requires
of the candidate.
How does one please the bitch-goddess Success? To put it more
politely: How are the future leaders of major enterprises assessed,
sifted, groomed, and finally chosen? Which are the candidates who
tend to "top out" at an early stage of the climb toward success? How do
the more adept manage to work their way up to positions near those
mist-covered peaks? What, in short, is the process of success? And
what are the implications of the present process for the men
involved—and for the rest of us?
This exploration might reasonably be viewed as a new phase of a
continuing investigation, a further endeavor to discern what is
happening to the individual in the face of the new kinds of pressures
generated by our violently changing world. In this instance the
individual is the rising executive who may, for better or worse, come to
have considerable influence upon society at large.
Primarily our focus will be on the rising executive of the medium-
to large-size U.S. profit-making institution. I have also consulted
executives of small companies, executives of universities and of
government (where there are also pyramids), and executives in
countries outside the United States, for purposes of comparison.
This process of success in the sixties merits our concern as well as
our curiosity. Corporations are becoming more and more important in
the lives of most of us; and more and more young Americans are
committing their aspirations to these institutions. Increasingly we live
in a corporate society. Business executives are seen as our foremost
social models if not our leading heroes. They enjoy the greatest
material rewards we can offer, and some of the greatest rewards of
prestige. (In Great Britain and France business executives enjoy far
less prestige.)
One of the easiest ways to sell homes in the United States at
practically any level above that of the working class is to call them
"executive" houses. A Long Island developer offering houses that he
labels "Executive Suites" bills them as "the summit of luxury for the
Top Level Executive" and promises that their dimensions will "reflect
your own success." In at least seven cities there are now hotels or
motels called "The Executive" or "Executive House" or "The
Executive Inn." Albert of Fifth Avenue, New York, features the
"Executive Haircut" in his advertisements. My own wife Virginia
keeps track of our social engagements in a book labeled The
Executive's Appointment Calendar. She can't remember where she got
it.
The librarian at the Harvard Graduate School of Business
Administration told me, with some amazement, that the library's
journal containing synopses of technical articles on management had
been turning up in the anteroom of a dentist's office. The title of the
journal—The Executive.
The power of the executives who reach points near the top of major
corporations is already tremendous, and will increase considerably as
their far-flung organizations continue to grow in size and as the fruits
of exploding technology flow into their hands.
Few of us would disagree when Crawford H. Greenewalt, chairman
of Du Pont, states: "Whatever he is, the businessman is the product and
pilot of the system under which most of us earn our livings." And it
might be added that the tens of millions of Americans who work under
the direction of an executive well know that his impact on their life can
be massive, especially if he is afflicted with the emotional fractures
frequently associated with the climbing process. Further, the notions of
executives on what is appropriate and estimable in behavior and
aspirations color the attitudes of the rest of us. Robert Lounsbury, the
thoughtful general counsel of Kennecott Copper, commented to me:
"The executive class is transmitting an attitude to society which has a
profound impact upon society itself."
The demand for executives is rising, and apparently will continue
to rise for several years, despite the fact that automation is finally
starting to take over many of such lower decision-making functions as
inventory control. Though some would disagree, Nation's Business
puts the need at 50 per cent more executives by 1970.
Changes are occurring in the kinds of management skills called for
in the breed that will succeed in the future. For one thing we are only
beginning to visualize the probable impact on the American economy
of the new European unity which is emerging. Soon U.S. businessmen
will be facing the prospect of an economy that has become second-
largest in a number of respects. Both the competition and the new
markets that European unity promises—plus the need of U.S.
companies to expand significantly to develop world markets—call for
new imaginative kinds of business leadership. There is grave doubt
that American industry has been developing enough of the kind of
leaders who will be competent to guide their enterprises effectively in
this new environment. Management experts concede that a serious
"managerial lag" is developing between the challenges emerging and
the skills available to cope with them. Some call this lag the single
greatest problem facing free enterprise in the United States.
Another development which is producing a change in requirements
is the rush to diversify. Increasingly, companies are becoming
constellations of enterprises. In the large, highly diversified company,
it is now unlikely that you will find an executive near the top who has
an immense detailed grasp of all aspects of producing and selling all
his company's products. I found that some executives were not even
able to list with confidence all the products their company now makes.
This change has tended to denigrate special knowledge, at least near
the top, and to emphasize instead all-purpose administrative skills—
and "personality."
There appears to be a growing conviction that corporate profits in
the future will depend relatively less on materials, money, and labor,
and relatively more on "management," than in the past. Consequently
industry is focusing an immense amount of attention on the caliber of
its management personnel, often spending up to $50,000 to recruit and
break in a moderately high-level executive.
This corporate interest in managers has brought about a fantastic
proliferation in the consulting firms that specialize in helping
companies choose, groom, and assess executives and semi-executives.
The Manhattan telephone directory lists forty-seven firms starting with
the word Executive and twenty-seven starting with Management.

Perhaps a word ought to be said at this point about my own
procedure in this exploration. I sought to look at the rising executive
from a wide range of vantage points. Thus the approach might,
hopefully, be called eclectic.
The aim has been to try to bring together as comprehensive—and
unvarnished—a picture as possible of what it takes in the way of skills,
commitments, strategies, physique, mental state, observance of rules,
education, background, and so on, to get ahead in the modern
corporation. In the process I have explored a number of intriguing
possibilities for improving the caliber of executives and their
environment.
I talked first of all with a great many people who have devoted
their careers to evaluating executives. There were talks with most of
the nation's leading executive recruiters and with a few executive
coaches (a specialty in this area). There were talks with officials of
most of the leading psychological-testing and psychological-consulting
firms that specialize in executive appraisal. One unforgettable day I
spent several hours in the company of aspiring executives submitting
to a battery of psychological tests designed to assess my own executive
potential. And I spent another day sitting in with a number of corporate