Newsmakers
Thumbs
Up Down Under
One-Two
Punch
You
Can Bank on This
Holding
Steady in the Wild Blue Yonder
Burger
Art
Thumbs Up Down Under
It
was with mixed emotions that Rich Wilson (MBA ’82)
and his coskipper Bill Biewenga set sail from New York Harbor
last September aboard their 53-foot trimaran Great American
II, heading south on a long-planned voyage to Melbourne, Australia,
fourteen thousand miles away. Only days earlier, on September
11, they had interrupted their departure preparations at the Chelsea
Piers to race to Ground Zero to assist with rescue efforts. Wilson,
a severe asthmatic, used his knowledge of the condition to aid
medical technicians treating victims of smoke and dust inhalation;
Biewenga, a Vietnam vet, helped medics assess the severity of
victims’ injuries. “What was remarkable was the number
and diversity of the volunteers,” Wilson told the Washington
Post (September 16, 2001). “You saw that this was the
strength of our country.”
Reeling from the tragedy, the two men were uncertain about their
voyage. “We had a lot of discussions about whether we should
go or not go,” Wilson confessed to the Boston Globe
(December 9, 2001). But eventually they decided to proceed, and
on September 19, with the New York State flag fluttering from
the mast, they cast off.
Once on the high seas, the two men’s thoughts returned to
beating the record of 69 days, 14 hours for the New York–Melbourne
trip, set in 1855–56 by the clipper ship Mandarin,
which was carrying American prospectors to the Australian Gold
Rush. The entire effort was also an educational experience for
thousands of U.S. and Australian schoolchildren. Students studied
a special, accredited curriculum related to the journey and received
daily updates and regular audio and video reports from the two
sailors. The information was relayed through Wilson’s education-through-adventures
company, sitesALIVE!, and its interactive Web site (www.sitesalive.com).
On November 27, Great American II sailed into Melbourne
Harbor, breaking Mandarin’s record by some 29 hours.
“This is the first land we’ve seen since New York, but
I tell you, it never gets dull out there,” Wilson told The
Australian (November 28, 2001). As he explained to the Boston
Globe (December 9, 2001), “There’s no place to stop.
There’s no help. There’s nothing within a thousand miles.
That means you’ve got to be extremely careful with everything
you do — even lighting the stove.”
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One Two Punch
It’s
sometimes called “the second toughest job in America,”
so with Michael Bloomberg (MBA ’66) now the mayor
of New York City and George W. Bush (MBA ’75) in the
White House, HBS alumni have shown once again they relish nothing
more than a daunting challenge. Bloomberg acknowledged as much
in the wee hours of his election victory over Democrat Mark Green
last November, saying, “We are clearly going to have enormous
problems, but I know we are up to the task. New York is alive
and well and open for business!” (New York Times,
November 7, 2001). Among the challenges Bloomberg faces, the Times
noted, were some one hundred thousand jobs lost due to the economic
downturn and a multibillion-dollar budget gap. The new mayor has
said he will not raise taxes but will cut expenses and impose
a hiring freeze.
Bloomberg took the oath of office in the early hours of New Year’s
Day, at a ceremony in which Wynton Marsalis, Bette Midler, former
mayor Rudy Giuliani, and other politicians and celebrities participated.
Declared Bloomberg, “We will rebuild, renew, and remain the
capital of the free world” (Agence France-Presse,
January 1, 2002).
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You Can Bank on This
The
rise and fall of the Dow has been variously correlated to hemlines,
Christmas tree sales, Super Bowl results, and tea leaves. But
Ray Soifer (MBA ’65), chairman of Soifer Consulting,
a firm that focuses on global financial services, has his own
prognostication theory: The more Harvard MBAs who go to Wall Street,
the worse the market will do. “It’s not that Harvard
MBAs are stupid,” Soifer assured the Financial Times
(September 12, 2001). Instead, he explained, Wall Street firms
make generous offers in good times when the market is doing well,
thus attracting lots of Harvard MBAs. When the outlook is murkier,
Wall Street’s offers aren’t so enticing, and the cream
of the crop considers offers from other sectors. If 10 percent
or fewer of graduating Harvard MBAs opt for careers in financial
services, Soifer says that’s a long-term buy signal; if 30
percent or more of MBAs choose such careers, it’s time to
trim your stock portfolio.
Psst…the Class of 2001 saw 32 percent of its members head
to Wall Street.
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Holding Steady in the Wild Blue Yonder
The
day after Northern Alliance troops rolled into Kabul as the Taliban
withdrew without a fight, Secretary of the Air Force James
Roche (DBA ’72) cautioned CNN’s Larry King, “This
is going to go on for some time. And we can’t be elated one
day and depressed the next. We have got to be very steady through
this. But we will keep hunting them” (Larry King Live,
November 13, 2001). Roche further noted that for the Air Force,
“there’s really two conflicts going on at the same time
. . . we have eleven thousand airmen who are involved in protecting
American skies every day.”
Prior to assuming his new post in June, Roche, a former Northrop
Grumman executive, served in the U.S. Navy for 23 years and was
commander of the guided missile destroyer USS Buchanan.
Other assignments in Washington have included various posts at
the State Department and Pentagon. As Air Force boss, Roche, supported
by the Air Force chief of staff, oversees 750,000 military and
civilian personnel and a budget of some $70 billion.
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Burger Art
Talk
about thinking outside the box! Since time immemorial, Americans
have slapped and shaken ketchup bottles at their peril, hoping
the red stuff would mostly wind up on their burgers and not in
their laps. Well, that’s all so yesterday, shoppers, thanks
largely to Heinz North America managing director Casey Keller
(MBA ’89), Adweek Magazines Newswire reported
(October 15, 2001).
Assigned to reinvigorate the company’s ketchup sales, Keller
talked to children, the condiment’s biggest fans, who told
him the bottles were too unwieldy. Oh, and another thing, said
the kids: “Make the ketchup a different color, like green
or purple, with nozzles we can use to draw on our food.”
Declared Keller, “That proved to be the ultimate ‘aha’
experience that gave birth to EZ Squirt.”
Heinz EZ Squirt Ketchup, featuring colors such as Funky Purple
and Blastin’ Green (along with Tomato Red) in a kid-friendly
container, was launched in late 2000 and is so popular, it’s
making a run at the sales crown seized by that upstart condiment,
salsa. Furthermore, Adweek noted, it’s “encouraging
pint-size painters to add splashes of green and squirts of purple
onto canvases where only daubs of red had roamed.” “As
long as consumers are buying the product, we won’t stop reinventing
ketchup,” said Keller, who was named 2001’s Grand Marketer
of the Year by Brandweek magazine for his colorful innovations.
“The only boundary is what kids tell us they want.”
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