Executive View by Marshall Loeb: Rebel with Many Causes

Executive View/Marshall Loeb

The Organization Man, wrote William H. Whyte in the final paragraph of his 1956 classic, must fight The Organisation William Whyte, meet fletcher Byrom. A feisty fellow, Byrom lives by the philosophy that the highest form of loyalty is to battle organizational rigidities and inertia.

Just after World War II, admirals had been nervous about the stocky ingotsize metallurgist from Penn State who badgered them to scrap their old anti-aircraft guns and start developing surface-to-air missiles. Byrom won that round—and he won the Navy's Distinguished Civilian Service Award A few years later, by-the-book bosses at Koppers Co. fumed when they learned that their young executive disobeyed orders and put in a costly distillation process. When it proved enormously profitable, they hailed him.

Because it is hard to keep a good rebel down, Byrom became President of Koppers at 42. In the 18 years since, sales of the Pittsburgh conglomerate (chemicals, metals and forest products) have almost quintupled to well over $ 1 billion, and Byrom, by cheerfully delegating authority, can now spend half of his 16-hour days spreading his eclectic messages to bureaucrats, business people, reverend clergy and irreverent students. He draws his ideas from many intellectuals— a catholic collection that includes Social Activist Saul Alinsky, Semanticist Senator S.I. Hayakawa, Anthropologist Margaret Mead. Byrom always argues that people have to break down the barriers within and between corporations, state governments, whole nations. Make room for individualism and incentive.

His own company, he is happy to say, has no organization charts, no procedure manuals. He encourages managers to take risks, even make mistakes; they will learn from them. Says he: "We don't want good administrators, because that implies efficient operation of the status quo." He advises junior executives and foremen: "We, top management, will set standards. It is up to you to decide how to get things done."

The same good sense should apply to the shotgun marriage between Government and business, in Bryom's view. Instead of telling companies how to combat pollution or industrial accidents, the Government should set short-term and long-term goals then use a tax system to reward companies that exceed them and penalize firms that "fail. Exasperated by the managers and regulgators who think that they can make sweeping decisions from a distant pinnacle he likes to say, "Santayana defined fanatics as those people who know what they are doing is what God would be doing if he only had all the facts."