Chief Executive (U.S.) articles from May 2005

Chief Executive (U.S.) archives from May 2005

What we stand for.(EDITOR'S NOTE)(Editorial)
May 1, 2005... New York State Attorney General Eliot Spitzer attacked me personally when he appeared on "This Week," the George Stephanopoulos Sunday morning television show. When the host mentioned my comment several months ago that any chief executive would...

The debate over Sarbanes-Oxley.(FEEDBACK)(Letter to the Editor)
May 1, 2005... In true running terms, compliance with Section 404 of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act was a demanding dash for all involved, but only the first lap in a much longer journey. Corporate America expended significant resources to meet the recent...

Public vs. private companies.(FEEDBACK)(Letter to the Editor)
May 1, 2005... What a great contrast in your last issue of three deeply related issues: CEO tenure, Sarbox and Bose (January/February 2005). Amar Bose gets to plan products 10 years out, and the CEO of a public company gets to spend time figuring out what...

The dollar, weak or strong.(FEEDBACK)(Letter to the Editor)
May 1, 2005... I do not agree with your opinion on the current exchange value of the dollar ("In Defense of the Dollar," January/February 2005). Taking a long-term view, what is happening to the exchange rate is consistent and appropriate with the trade and...

Fixing America's schools.(FEEDBACK)(Letter to the Editor)
May 1, 2005... I read with great distress the May cover story, "Fixing America's Future," especially the chart on page 28, "How American Students Stack Up To Their International Peers." The chart is irrelevant. The U.S. is basically the only industrialized...

Dates changed for Korean Summit.
May 1, 2005... The World Information and Communication Technology Summit, scheduled to be held June 9-11 in Seoul, South Korea, has been moved to May 18 and will be held in conjunction with the Seoul Digital Forum, May 19 and 20. The Ministry of...

Darts & roses.(CEO WATCH)(Brief Article)
May 1, 2005... DART... * RICHARD NOTEBAERT of Qwest Communications for his bid to take over MCI. Qwest is damn near bankrupt. Notebaert must be delusional--or have a case of "Rocky Mountain High." ROSE... * PHIL PURCELL, at Morgan Stanley....

HP chief faces short honeymoon.(TRANSITIONS)(Hewlett-Packard Co.)(appointment)
May 1, 2005... LESS TALK, more execution. That's what Hewlett-Packard needs in newly minted CEO Mark Hurd. Hurd, 48, replaces Carly Fiorina, who was unceremoniously dumped by HP's board in February. Hurd is a low-key guy. He's as comfortable with the...

Darts & roses.(CEO WATCH)(Brief Article)
May 1, 2005... ROSE... * SANYO'S BOARD, for bucking convention and hiring veteran female journalist Tomoyo Nonaka for the CEO spot. Let's hope she can convince her former colleagues that a turnaround isn't a fantasy. DART... * STEVE JOBS....

Investors doubt CEO ethic.(LASTING IMPRESSIONS)(Chief executive officers)
May 1, 2005... NO MATTER HOW aboveboard CEOs operate, when it comes to investor trust, they can't seem to get no respect. Less than half of all retail investors have confidence that CEOs of public companies are engaged in ethical business practices, per a...

CEOs treading water.(CEO CONFIDENCE INDEX)(Chief executive officers)
May 1, 2005... MOST CHIEF EXECUTIVES seem to be doing a lot of waiting and watching these days. Among the factors keeping them on edge are oil prices, interest rates, global competition and U.S. trade and fiscal deficits. Reflecting their hesitation, overall...

Should the top roles be split? The Brits say yes. But in the U.S., executives believe no one single model fits all companies.(C-SUITE CONFIDENTIAL)
May 1, 2005... Splitting the roles of chairman and CEO didn't get much ink until the governance crisis sent critics searching for magic solutions to heal Corporate America. In the increasingly boisterous debate, some argue that having CEOs run their boards...

Leapfrogging past today's IT mess: intelligence is moving toward the edge of networks.(CHIEF CONCERN)
May 1, 2005... There are two major changes impacting the conduct of global business. Today's CEOs must understand and deal with these changes in real time. The first is the advent of the virtual enterprise. Companies are no longer insular. Their supply...

What kind of U.S. manufacturing survives? As the Henry Ford system goes away, a new model emerges.(CHIEF CONCERN)
May 1, 2005... The U.S. economy is about to enter its fourth year of recovery. One wonders how that is possible when pundits proclaim that China has all but hollowed out the American manufacturing base. Could U.S. manufacturers actually be doing something...

Getting R & D back on track: basic research, now at risk, needs major attention.(THOUGHT LEADER)(Research and development)
May 1, 2005... Increasingly, U.S. researchers in industry, academia and government are playing it safe. The kind of freewheeling basic research that spawned new industries--from genetic engineering and the integrated circuit to wireless telephony and...

In search of a new financial order: one global standard for financial reporting makes sense.(THOUGHT LEADER)
May 1, 2005... Consistent, comparable and understandable financial information is the lifeblood of commerce and investing. Despite growing globalization, national borders still restrict financial reporting. Financial reports produced by companies domiciled in...

Is Japan open for takeovers? Some, yes. But not the hostile variety.(M & A)
May 1, 2005... Day in and day out, headlines in respected Japanese newspapers scream: "Livedoor buys another 3 percent of Nippon Broadcasting Systems (NBS) shares." Or, about NBS's parent company: "Fuji Television will do 50 billion yen new share offerings to...

George David steps out: chief executive of the year David wants to take United Technologies higher, faster and farther.(Cover Story)
May 1, 2005... For many years, United Technologies and chief executive George David seemed to have labored in the shadow of General Electric and Jack Welch. Both companies are based in Connecticut and both are "conglomerates," a term neither likes but one...

In defense of Sarbox: despite "noise" from some CEOs, Deloitte's James Quigley says Sarbanes-Oxley is working well.(GOVERNANCE)(Interview)
May 1, 2005... James Quigley, chief executive of Deloitte & Touche, argues that the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 should not be diluted or amended, but its implementation could be clarified. He made his remarks in an interview with Editor-in-Chief William J....

Out of the frying pan ... once a rising star at GM, Mark Hogan bolted to vie for a CEO's job at a smaller company.(MANUFACTURING)(General Motors)(Mark Hogan joins Magna International Inc.)
May 1, 2005... On the first Monday in April, Mark Hogan's beloved Fighting Illini finished second in the national men's college-basketball tournament after spending nearly the entire season as America's No. 1-ranked team. The same thing may have happened to...

Rick Wagoner: too much Mr. Nice Guy; GM's recent shake-up means it's make-or-break time.(NEWS ANALYSIS)
May 1, 2005... General Motors has spent decades trying to figure out how to remain atop the business it had led for the previous half-century. But those ambitions came to an end when CEO Rick Wagoner made the shocking announcement in March that GM would have...

Lessons from Baghdad: the military has much to teach CEOs about supply chains and RFID.(MANAGEMENT)
May 1, 2005... Large plasma screens line a wall at the Joint Intelligence Operations Center (JIOC) at the U.S. Central Command headquarters in Tampa, Fla., which oversees military activities in Iraq and Afghanistan. Unmanned spy drones, firefights in progress...

Finding the "right" shore: CEOs are getting savvier about choosing a location for outsourcing.(GLOBAL)
May 1, 2005... Reynaldo Gil couldn't afford to make a mistake. The founder and CEO of Commendo Software, a three-year-old startup based in Fremont, Calif., had just landed the first big customer--Mexican giant Cemex--for his company's patented virtual...

Not getting Asia: patronizing stereotypes can subvert entire business strategies.(GLOBAL)(Interview)
May 1, 2005... A newly published book, The Asian Mystique, argues that Westerners bring a whole set of illusions and expectations--and therefore subconscious assumptions--to their interactions with Asia, based on the West's historical contacts with the region...

Flight of the creative class: the U.S. must invest more in R & D and universities to retain its best and brightest.(BOOK EXCERPT)
May 1, 2005... As the global economy becomes more dependent upon knowledge industries, nation-states must nurture what Richard Florida, professor at George Mason University's School of Public Policy, calls "the creative class." The United States, however, is...

Desert luxury: a burgeoning oasis, Dubai is the new "in" place for the vacationing CEO.(EXECUTIVE LIFE)
May 1, 2005... New York City entrepreneur Grace Gallo is three years away from turning 50, but she's already emailing friends and family to save the date for a big birthday bash abroad. The location? A place unthinkable just five years ago: Dubai. ...

Cars for connoisseurs: pricey wheels combine top style, with performance to match.(WHEELS)
May 1, 2005... It won't do to have the chief executive of a major public company driving around in a Rolls-Royce these days, given the tough regulatory and governance environment. But a guy who owns his own company can drive whatever he wants. "Most of my...

Putting your angriest customers to work: CEOs benefit by getting fed-up customers to tell it like it is.(FLIP SIDE)(Chief executive officers)
May 1, 2005... Certain anecdotes about turning around troubled businesses are so poignant that everyone should know them by heart. One such anecdote was recently published in a Wall Street Journal column debating whether now-deposed Hewlett-Packard CEO Carly...

It's time for Eliot Spitzer to step down.(EDITORIAL)(American International Group Inc.)
May 1, 2005... WHEN NEW YORK STATE ATTORNEY GENERAL ELIOT SPITZER started out on his quest to prosecute excesses in the financial markets, he was tough-minded but fair. We had just witnessed the debacles at Enron, World-Com and elsewhere. The system needed a...