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"The high road to greater progress runs along the line of cooperation between business and the public. . . . The businessman must work out his own salvation, without asking or expecting too much from others. His attention must be concentrated as much upon what he can give to the cause of human progress as upon what he can get. . . .
"He [or she] can avoid these results by recognizing the tendencies of intelligent public opinion and by cultivating an idealism which shall precede and not follow the public conscience. "He [or she] must let the public know what he is doing and why." Wigginton Ellis Creed, 1923 Review of B. C. Forbes, "Men Who Are Making the West" is coming next week.
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Are the chief executives who are breaking up the largest and best of America’s corporations making the right decision? Alfred P. Sloan would probably remark that the weakness in these institutions isn’t within the size and scope of their corporations, but in their top executives’ limited thinking and over-centralization of their organizations.
“It is often extremely difficult to get a man [an executive] in the frame of mind where he will gladly seek to gather from other people in the organization what would offset … his [or her] own weakness. “Yet this must be done in a large organization to bring about a maximum of efficiency and effectiveness.” Although this concept was not articulated directly by Watson Jr. when he reorganized the IBM Corporation after the death of his father, coordinated decentralization was at the heart of how the son kicked in the IBM’s growth afterburners.
It is a concept that should be revitalized before breaking up the largest and best of our old American, industrialist-built institutions: IBM, General Electric, and Johnson and Johnson. Industrialist-minded chief executives understand that larger is better … easier to control … and easier to manage with coordinated decentralization … Chief executives must empower their top generals to lead but be ready to exercise a "coordinating influence" when necessary. Who are America's chief executives’ top counselors? Would they listen to Alfred P. Sloan? The country needs more industrialist-minded leaders … … like Alfred P. Sloan. Have American Corporations built homes for their employees? Yes. One example among many was IBM—International Business Machines—which, under the direction of Thomas J. Watson Sr., built homes for its employees through the Endicott Highlands Development Corporation from 1935–36 through 1947–49. The corporation was especially active after World War II in providing homes—at cost—for the corporation’s World War II veterans in the Endicott area.
[See Footnote in the article: There were many other 20th Century home-building corporations]
The Honorable Alexander Wiley wrote: “A term that is frequently heard these days is: ‘Un-American.’ How can you and I be sure that it should not at times be applied to us—that we ourselves are really thinking in the American way, living in the American way, actually being American in our personal lives? “The answer to that question is not as simple as it would appear to be. … I submit that one way by which we can be sure that we are thinking American is from time to time to take ‘Little Journeys to the Constitution,’ there to familiarize ourselves anew with the basic doctrine and the basic landmarks of the American heritage.”
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Peter E. GreulichPete has been studying IBM and early American corporate history since his retirement in 2011. These are his thoughts and musings, and of those whose biographies he has read with links to articles and book reviews on this website. Archives
March 2023
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