Extreme Experience: Septuagenarian CEOs

(page 2 of 2)

They can be adept at weighing risks and spotting opportunity.

These are useful attributes at a time of epic upheaval. In industry after industry, rapid-fire change is putting executives to the test. Many companies also find themselves lacking institutional knowledge, partly a result of the incessant job-hopping of today's generation of managers. In such circumstances, the out-to-pasture retiree can look like a savior. Gerard R. Roche, senior chairman of headhunter Heidrick & Struggles (HSII), 77, has placed several older executives in recent years. "The key," he says, "is that they still have their marbles."

Typically, bad things have to happen before companies make an exception to retirement rules. In June, Hearst CEO Victor F. Ganzi resigned unexpectedly. The board turned to 75-year-old Frank A. Bennack Jr. to return to the job he had held for 24 years. In 2004, Delta Air Lines (DAL) brought in board member Gerald Grinstein, then in his 70s, to run the airline. As for Lutz, at 76 he holds arguably the most important job of his long career. Now General Motors (GM)' vice-chairman, he's overseeing the carmaker's shift away from gas-guzzling trucks and SUVs.

Older executives often evince a been-there-done-that serenity. "I feel much freer about taking risks," says Harold Burson, who co-founded public-relations firm Burson-Marsteller in 1953 and at 87 continues to advise blue-chip clients. "The planet is not going to stop spinning if I'm wrong." And despite the conventional wisdom that people become more conservative as they age, Burson says he routinely rejects orthodoxy. For example, he encourages CEO clients to speak out much more forcefully on public issues, such as trade. "Fifteen to 20 years ago," Burson says, "I would have said, keep your head under the parapet and work the system."

Most senior executives cite the value of such intangibles as gut, patience, and perspective. They say younger executives often lack these. "Sure, younger managers don't have the advantage of experience," says Redstone. "But I find they don't study history to be able to make the best decisions for their companies." Others say the MBAs they work with are overly fixated on data and have had the creativity educated out of them. Siebert, who runs her eponymous investment firm, says young traders, having only experienced a bull market, are now unprepared to battle a bear. "They made money so quickly and in such vast quantities," she says, "that they didn't realize they could lose it twice as fast."

Finally, age confers on its wearer a certain immunity to internal politics. These folks can get away with saying things their younger colleagues would never dare. Lutz has become a kind of provocateur at GM. He was the only executive willing to push for an electric car despite GM's debacle the first time around. "One colossal advantage of being in extra innings is you can tell it like it is, say what you think, and largely eschew political caution," he says. "I often ask, rhetorically, if they don't like it, what are they going to do? Send me into early retirement?"

Lowry is a senior writer for BusinessWeek in New York.

With David Welch, Burt Helm, Jessica Silver-Greenberg, and Susan Zegel