Carl Icahn Shares Advice With Grads

we today are in a crisis in our economy I believe and I know you've been studying this we have a lot of problems one of problems in this country one of our major problems is management and their ability to compete with exceptions we have terrible management in this country the system is dysfunctional I can't tell you how bad our boards are with exceptions of course I sit on a lot of boards I don't have to watch satting at night live anymore I just sit at the board meetings they and I I will tell you that it's a sad commentary that we have a inability to compete you can blame unions to some extent but the real problem is that boards there's a symbiotic relationship between boards and CEOs today and as a result as a result there is no way to hold these guys accountable except somebody like myself comes along or some other person who is really will to challenge them but you have to go through contortions there's no corporate democracy so you have to go to the contortions take even challenge these guys I had the way in a digression few minutes or a minute the way a CEO is elected with exceptions is again it's sad commentary the way you get to be a CEO this but I'm going to tell you that maybe this is change in it you think about this and don't get into the mold that I'm telling you most CEOs get into to get elected I call it anti-darwinian it I call it anti survival of the fittest when you see these guys who run these companies today for the most part with a number a number a number of exception guy is the fraternity president in college and I'm not telling you I'm sure that some of you out there that a fraternity president said I'm not telling you all of them are bad guys but I remember in college and the fraternity presidents kind of guy that a sort of likable guy the guy that is always at the frat house with me it was an eating Club when I when I went to college but it always be there you know and if you went over there you wonder what if you ever studied because whatever you were feeling down whatever you I shoot a little pool have a drink your girlfriend didn't show up or something you go over and he was there he's always there how you doing called what's going on you know your girlfriend didn't come you can't trust any of them usual conversation you go oh that's great yeah thank you you liked the guy play a little pool have a drink with him and obviously when it came time to get elected to be the frat president of this eating club president he'd say great you know and you and you phone for now this guy goes on you know he goes on into the world of business and you likeable guy maybe not too bright maybe even a buffoon but like likable and and uh also a good political guarding because you know there was always competition to be the head of the club and he's good political so he has all these qualifications he doesn't make waves he understands survivor being a survivor and he moves up the corporate ladder and this is what we have today they move up the corporate ladder don't make waves not a threat to the guy above them and they just keep moving up and up never had many ideas but just was there so this doesn't help our corporate corporations very much it doesn't help us be competitive it's the wrong people to this job today in our companies but he just keeps moving up and moving up and moving up the ladder right and the board really doesn't care because the boards are all just getting there when you're going to avoid meeting the first thing you get your check you look at it you see bunch of graphs they show you the light is pretty bad a lot of red lines green lines yellow lines all going up there's always something going up you've got some line going up no matter how bad the company is always lines and I used to sit there I mean I'm color blind I don't even understand what that got on line sorry I don't think anybody does and you know they always have that so that's what goes on at your board me and the CEO shows it very smiling and then they said well sometimes you say well George another CEO well how come we're losing all this money and this red line is going up as well you see that's the line that we estimate a 1982 of you do the e better from the developer oh good good good good you're doing a good job you know where's dinner tonight guys you know the bellman boondoggle gots theater tickets great okay here's your check right and that's why you have the problem in derivatives today and you have all these headaches because the guy's known how to literally run the company so anyway this guy who's the CEO candidate keeps moving up and up and up the ladder he's a survivor so this as a survivor he's not going to ever have a number-two guy underneath them the smarter than him he doesn't want a guy that can challenge him because god forbid somebody on the board should meet the number 2 guy and he's moving up and up the ladder till he becomes number 2 to the CEO and now he's number 2 to the CEO and you know sooner or later the CEO retire the CEO puts him there because the CEO realized this guy is not a challenge because a little dumber than the CEO so now he becomes a CEO and now he finds his number two guy a little dumber than him right well sooner or later we're going to be run by morons avoid by definition and thank you okay and and we are not far from that now it's a sad commentary on our country so when you go out there you can be one or two kinds of guys moving ahead and a lot of you're real smart kids and I see you getting four averages and god it's pretty impressive to me and you can be a guy that thinks for yourself and I think the world and that corporations are not waiting for that there's two kinds of guys as I say there are CEOs that really do think of themselves that are innovative they go against the trend and I will say that you know I've had a few shall we say tips with Bennett LeBeau we've had a few altercation but Bennett Lobo is one of the guys that you should try to be like because Bennett LeBeau never put up with that stuff then I would talk about it and Bennett would always go in there and always do we you know what he went when he was a CEO and when he was doing it now I don't know quite what he does but but but I would tell you that Bennett and I say this not because we're friends because we've had a lot of different altercations or whatever but I always respected him because at least he you would go in there and he would do he would go against the trend he'd go against the board he'd go against the people there and that is what you should seek to be when you go out when you go out into the world you should try to stand up against the trend even though it might mm you literally might cost your job in my course your promotion but in the end think for yourself be innovative try me I'm not telling you go in and tell them what to do you got to be careful about that obviously but but if you have ideas go slam the table don't worry about it come up with your own imagination too because that's what this country needs

Channel: LeBow College of Business

Views: 78,611

Keywords: carl, icahn, candid, advice, funny, lebow, business, college, commencement, drexel

Id: FcWg4897yIM

Length: 7min 27sec (447 seconds)

Published: Tue Jul 08 2008