The Cloistered Chief

From the days of Commodore Vanderbilt and J. P. Morgan through such recent victims as U.S. Steel's Roger Blough, many big businessmen have shown at crucial moments a surprising inability to influence--or even to gauge--the public mind. Last week another businessman, Clarence Randall, 71, retired chairman of Chicago's Inland Steel Co., offered his own explanation. Wrote Randall in the New York Times Magazine: "Responsibility breeds isolation . . . After an executive reaches the very top, he is seldom seen in public and seldom heard. He becomes a myth." The result is "that when the great storm comes, as it does sooner or later to every large corporation, and he is driven out into the turbulence of public opinion, he may not be ready to go on deck.

"As a youngster he lived in a suburb and rode the commuting trains ... He rubbed elbows with a motley group of friends and neighbors and scrambled with them for a seat when the train came in . . . Public opinion flowed around him." But with success, writes Randall, "his schedule became so complex and the end of his day so unpredictable that a limousine and chauffeur became indispensable . . . Gone forever was the boisterous elbow-rubbing with friends who might hold contrary opinions."

Private Fish. The young executive who used to lunch in a neighborhood coffee shop advances to a private dining room or eats in a secluded club. When he becomes top brass, says Randall, he flies on executive airplanes, misses the conversation of a random seat mate. Even his recreation is isolated: "As chairman, his golf dates are rare, are always arranged in advance by his secretary, and the foursome is invariably selected from not over six possibilities. If duck shooting is his sport, he will be found at a small private club where no uncouth voice is heard; if it is fishing the lodge will be remote and the waters privately stocked and patrolled."

"None of this," writes Randall, "has come about because high office has made him snobbish or prestige-conscious. It stems naturally from the responsibility he bears, and the honest desire of those about him to protect him." Nonetheless, the man in the executive suite "seldom sees anyone except those who show him deference, and almost never those who talk back . . . Lacking time to read the newspapers thoroughly, he comes to rely upon digests prepared for him by his public relations staff, and unconsciously he is likely to absorb their opinions too."

Randall advises the business executive to unwind himself from his cocoon. He should make himself available to news men, "not just the grand interview at the time of the annual meeting, but continuously." When he has strong feelings on public affairs, he should bypass company lobbyists or trade organizations and make his personal views known directly to Congressmen or Cabinet officers. He should speak frequently at colleges and universities, and subject himself to round tables where "questions will be searching but honest--the sort his staff will never ask."

The New Breed. Are Randall's fears real? Some businessmen think so. Says Union Tank Car President Edwin A. Locke Jr.: "A sort of philosophy has grown up that an executive should have a clear desk and sit around and do nothing but think. This is absolute nonsense." But there are others who think that Randall describes a passing generation of corporate leaders. Said William H. Rentschler. chairman of Chicago's Stevens Candy Kitchens: "The new breed is not that way. They take a much more active role in public life and are much more conversant with what's going on ... There may be some businessmen who still sit in their paneled offices, but to say that this is typical shows that Randall is out of touch."

Perhaps. But when a reporter last week sought to discuss the Randall piece with the chief executives of ten major U.S. corporations based in New York, all ten were "out of town." "tied up in a meeting." "on vacation" or "didn't care to comment."

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.