THE FACE OF BUSINESS

by Henry I. Meyer ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 1, 1980

An unvarnished but basically sympathetic account of how major American corporations actually get down to big business. Meyer, a retired Pennzoil executive, proceeds authoritatively from the general to the particular, first addressing the managerial, financial, shareholder-relations, etc., aspects of corporate existence. A midsection discusses how a typical company is organized and how it's manned, by line and staff employees (equal opportunity notwithstanding, few women need apply). The final few chapters concentrate on the personality, behavior, and training of the prototypical businessman. In one of Meyer's more antic analogies, the hierarchical structure of corporations is compared to the Army chain-of-command and the regimen of a baseball team--which richly rewards performance and mercilessly punishes nonfeasance. And apropos of the ubiquitous name game, Meyer wryly observes that ""to identify the real vice presidents, business has invented special titles: executive vice president, group vice president, and senior vice president. Lesser orders may conveniently be classified as hyphenated vice presidents: vice president-research. . . and so forth."" He also notes, amusingly, that business might have a stronger case for non-compliance with government regulations had it not equipped itself with a superfluity of computer capacity. With instructive material on how to read ""corporate report cards"" and other deceptive documents, a knowing and often entertaining narrative of the business story as it is.

Pub Date: June 1, 1980

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Amacom

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 1980

Categories: NONFICTION