Old not always wise

THERE’S a provocative table from the Media Studies department at Wits University doing the rounds on the internet.

It begs some interesting questions and provides an intriguing approach to age and the exercise of power.

It’s obvious the young are generally quicker of mind, more flexible and, of course, healthier than the elderly.

The elderly, on the other hand, have the advantages of wisdom and patience gleaned from many decades of experience.

Ideally, businesses will aim to have a spread of ages at the top but with go-getting executives bringing their energy and hustle to their day-to-day activities.

Older heads, usually at board level, can bring to the table their wide experience of both success and failure and offer constructive criticism.
 
Then there are the turnaround specialists, usually middle-aged hustlers who come to companies in trouble and do all the unpleasant things previous managers were – either through a misplaced sense of loyalty or a simple lack of courage – unable to bring themselves to effect.

Naturally, any corporation’s ethos will be influenced by the culture out of which it has grown.

In the old Japanese business culture you entered a company expecting to stay until retirement. Age is revered in Japan: thus before Western influences permeated its workplaces executives tended to be far older than their Western counterparts.
 
However, as businesses such as Toyota, Honda, Sony, Canon, Mitsubishi and many others grew into world players that all changed.

To compete internationally the Japanese realised that they had to move from ancient career patterns and retire those who had stayed too long.

Being businessmen who must survive in a competitive world they had to adjust. A good example is the African National Congress’s Tokyo branch – Hitachi – which bent its knee to South African corporate culture by gifting a free stake in its African operations to the ANC.

As the list below illustrates, African leaders tend to view positions as jobs for life.  
    
Abdoulaye Wade (Senegal): age 83.

Hosni Mubarak (Egypt): age 82.

Robert Mugabe (Zimbabwe): age 86.

Hifikepunye Pohamba (Namibia): age 74.

Rupiah Banda (Zambia): age 73.

Mwai Kibaki (Kenya): age 71.

Ellen Johnson Sirleaf (Liberia): age 75.

Muammar Gaddafi (Libya): age 68.

Jacob Zuma (South Africa): age 68.

Bingu Wa Mtalika (Malawi): age 76.

Paul Biya Mbinvondo (Cameroon): age 77.

Barack Obama (United States): age 48.

David Cameron (Britain): age 43.

Dimitri Medvedev (Russia): age 45.

Stephen Harper (Canada): age 51.

Julia Gillard (Australia): age 49.

Nicolas Sarkozy (France): age 55.

Luis Zapatero (Spain): age 49.

Jose Socrates (Portugal): age 53.

Angela Merkel (Germany): age 56.

Herman van Rompuy (Belgium): age 62.

African leaders’ average age is 76, compared with a Western average of 51 – a 25-year gap. Thus there’s an age difference of 25 years between the two sets of leaders.

As the data indicates, our continent prefers Big Old Men (and one lady) with big families and big fortunes.

Who is to say whether long tenure in office is good or bad?

Rupert Murdoch runs his News Corp at a vigorous 80, assisted by a young and glamorous Chinese wife. Warren Buffett, at 82, puffs along making gazillions; while our own Harry Oppenheimer left the chair of De Beers at 76.