I wonder how much of it is specifically giving power to women and minorities at the moment of failure vs there simply not being any white men available to take the helm when the ship is beginning to sink.
Sort of like when in the Middle Ages, the main way for a woman to rule a country was for all males in the line of succession to have died. See Elizabeth I.
In 2010, the CEO proclaimed an earnings target for 2015 based on nothing at all. There was no plan or reasonable expectation, just a flashy number. Investors ate it up and stock went up. No shortage of white men eager to be at the helm of a company that seemed to be on top of the world.
He promptly left the company and handed it over to a woman. As one could predict, a hollow wish about earnings without an actual plan failed to actually deliver. To a lot of folks who understood the nuance, they called it from the moment he said it.
However, the news coverage was basically that she failed to execute on his “plan”.
Now she wasn’t amazing leadership or anything, but neither was he. However he got to be celebrated as a strong leader mostly on the back of hollow promises and she got to be blamed for the fact it was hollow.
I suppose I can’t prove that it was because she was a woman that she got to be the fall person, but I am at least sure they could have found a willing white dude to be the fall guy at least.
The Old Boys Network protects its members, and does include giving them a friendly warning that something is a hot potato or poisened apple.
Once they all self-exclude for that reason, all that’s left is outsiders.
Mind you, the Old Boys Network is not a Men’s Network, it’s a “People From Very Specific Socio-Economic Origins” Network which for historical reasons is still mostly made up of males.
In practice that means the above mentioned “outsiders” aren’t just women, they’re also men from less priviledged backgrounds (which commonly includes immigrant minorities and at least their 1st generation descendants in the host country).
So yeah, people not in the “right” (having attended the right expensive schools, going to the right rich people get togethers, having upper class old-weath parents) social circles get given the top jobs only when none of the “proper” people want them.
You mean Cleopatra VII? There wasn’t an VIII. Her father, Ptolemy XII, doesn’t seem to have been assassinated. He specifically wanted her to be co-ruler with her younger brother, Ptolemy XIII, presumably because Cleo was both massively more competent and not ten years old, but thought their vassals might not have accepted a woman as sole ruler. XIII didn’t like that Cleo was more popular than him and the real ruler of Egypt, so he tried to have her killed, starting a civil war. Cleopatra’s faction won the war when XIII actually managed to accidentally drown himself fleeing a battle. Cleo then married her youngest brother, Ptolemy XIV, to solidify her rule. She likely had XIV assassinated to make her son the undisputed future Pharaoh after her, but there isn’t anything resembling solid evidence either way.
I wonder how much of it is specifically giving power to women and minorities at the moment of failure vs there simply not being any white men available to take the helm when the ship is beginning to sink.
Sort of like when in the Middle Ages, the main way for a woman to rule a country was for all males in the line of succession to have died. See Elizabeth I.
An example I can think of is IBM.
In 2010, the CEO proclaimed an earnings target for 2015 based on nothing at all. There was no plan or reasonable expectation, just a flashy number. Investors ate it up and stock went up. No shortage of white men eager to be at the helm of a company that seemed to be on top of the world.
He promptly left the company and handed it over to a woman. As one could predict, a hollow wish about earnings without an actual plan failed to actually deliver. To a lot of folks who understood the nuance, they called it from the moment he said it.
However, the news coverage was basically that she failed to execute on his “plan”.
Now she wasn’t amazing leadership or anything, but neither was he. However he got to be celebrated as a strong leader mostly on the back of hollow promises and she got to be blamed for the fact it was hollow.
I suppose I can’t prove that it was because she was a woman that she got to be the fall person, but I am at least sure they could have found a willing white dude to be the fall guy at least.
The Old Boys Network protects its members, and does include giving them a friendly warning that something is a hot potato or poisened apple.
Once they all self-exclude for that reason, all that’s left is outsiders.
Mind you, the Old Boys Network is not a Men’s Network, it’s a “People From Very Specific Socio-Economic Origins” Network which for historical reasons is still mostly made up of males.
In practice that means the above mentioned “outsiders” aren’t just women, they’re also men from less priviledged backgrounds (which commonly includes immigrant minorities and at least their 1st generation descendants in the host country).
So yeah, people not in the “right” (having attended the right expensive schools, going to the right rich people get togethers, having upper class old-weath parents) social circles get given the top jobs only when none of the “proper” people want them.
Or actively assassinating all your family members, like Cleopatra VIII.
In her defense, given the inbreeding of her line and her recorded intelligence she was probably the only competent person for the job.
You mean Cleopatra VII? There wasn’t an VIII. Her father, Ptolemy XII, doesn’t seem to have been assassinated. He specifically wanted her to be co-ruler with her younger brother, Ptolemy XIII, presumably because Cleo was both massively more competent and not ten years old, but thought their vassals might not have accepted a woman as sole ruler. XIII didn’t like that Cleo was more popular than him and the real ruler of Egypt, so he tried to have her killed, starting a civil war. Cleopatra’s faction won the war when XIII actually managed to accidentally drown himself fleeing a battle. Cleo then married her youngest brother, Ptolemy XIV, to solidify her rule. She likely had XIV assassinated to make her son the undisputed future Pharaoh after her, but there isn’t anything resembling solid evidence either way.