Movie Quote of the Day (‘How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying,’ With a Typical Executive Disclaimer of Responsibility)

J. B. Biggley [played by Rudy Vallee, on the left with Robert Morse]: “I realize that I'm the president of this company, the man that's responsible for everything that goes on here. So, I want to state, right now, that anything that happened is not my fault.”— How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying (1967), based on the novel by Shepherd Mead, adapted into a Pulitzer and Tony-winning musical with book by Abe Burrows, Jack Weinstock and Willie Gilbert, music and lyrics by Frank Loesser, movie written and directed by David Swift

For years, I’ve heard many politicians—I won’t say from which party—express their belief that government should be “run more like a business.” I wonder if the business they have in mind is J.B. Biggley’s World Wide Wicket Company?

Well, I’ll tell you: that statement of his that I’ve highlighted here is, for all intents and purposes, the continued default option for corporate executives who run into trouble, whether in the form of product or service failure, a disastrous earnings report, even fraud or misconduct. Their most common method for avoiding responsibility is to blame a predecessor.

Now that I think of it, a politician I can think of immediately has also taken this very course.

Quote of the Day (Jimmy Breslin, on a Con Artist Who Played Reporters and ‘Financial Geniuses’ for Suckers)

“[A] famous, well-tested theory…is named after Bill Corum, who once wrote sports for the Hearst papers when they were in New York….‘Gentlemen, this is the rule. A sucker has to get screwed.’ [I]nstead of horseplayers, the suckers who must get screwed are a combination of news reporters and financial people. It is all quite simple. Donald Trump handles these nitwit reporters with a new and most disgraceful form of bribery…He uses the reporters to create a razzle dazzle: there are five stories in the newspapers in the morning papers leading into 11 minutes of television at night. The financial people, who lead such dreary lives, believe what they read and see on television. Trump is larger than life. No, not Trump. Don't use that name. It's Donald! He cannot lose. The financial geniuses can't wait to rush into the glamour and lights. They want to touch Trump's arm. ‘Here, I'm from Prudential, the rock of Gibraltar. Take our $75 million to build another crap game. Can I ride on your boat?’"—Pulitzer Prize-winning American columnist and novelist Jimmy Breslin (1930-2017), “The Art of the Trump: Call It Corum's Law,” Newsday, June 7, 1990

Quote of the Day (Dave Barry, on What It Takes to be a Top Executive)

"I don't mean to suggest for a moment that all it takes to be a top executive is a custom-tailored European suit. You also need the correct shirt and tie." —Humor columnist Dave Barry, Claw Your Way to the Top: How to Become the Head of a Major Corporation in Roughly a Week (1986)  

Quote of the Day (‘The Economist,’ on C-Suite Virtue-Signaling)

“Homilies about successful executives involve lots of virtue-signaling. No boss is going to admit that on Friday nights they consume pizza and watch box sets of ‘Game of Thrones.’ Instead they claim to meditate or read improving books. Many business profiles resemble medieval ‘lives of the saints,’ with the subjects of the hagiographies receiving share options instead of canonization.”—“Bartleby” column, “Executive Privilege: The Annoying Habits of Highly Effective People,” The Economist, Sept. 29, 2018 (registration required)

Cases in point, from the article: Richard Branson of Virgin Group, Amazon’s Jeff Bezos and Apple’s Tim Cook. Feel free to add names of your own to the list.

(Photo of Tim Cook taken in January 2009, after Macworld Expo keynote, by Valery Marchive (LeMagIT).)