Incompetent leaders are everywhere

COMMENTARY When you do business all over the world, you've got to have local executives and representatives to give you the inside scoop on what's really going on behind the scenes. That's a necessity when the native language is different from your own, among other things.

Before I share with you what I learned while getting my passport pages filled up with customs stamps and helping to keep American Airlines out of bankruptcy for 20 years, keep one thing in mind. This is not about ideology. It's strictly about business and entirely based on observation.

What I've observed is that no matter how polite and deferential everyone is in the conference room, once they're outside that demilitarized zone, the gloves come off, the facade drops and what remains is the same wherever you go. What I'm referring to are nationalistic, geographic and racial stereotypes.

Of course, I've heard the same nonsense in my home country, as well. But if you think America's got a monopoly on that sort of thing because it's a cultural melting pot, you couldn't be more wrong. Talk about diversity. You would not believe how universal it is for otherwise intelligent and accomplished people to think their nationality is better than others.

Every country is similarly filled with executives and business people who think they're better off, better at certain things, more innovative, friendlier, even culturally superior than their counterparts across the border or ocean.

And for all I know, they might sometimes be right. Like I said, this is an observation, not an ideology, and stereotypes usually do seem to have some basis in reality. Besides, I have no interest in getting preachy here, since I'm probably as guilty as anyone. That's not the point.

The point is that this universal tendency toward nationalistic stereotyping is sort of comical and more than a little ironic for the simple reason that one nation's executives and leaders are just as likely to be incompetent as another nation's. The Peter Principle is universal. Stupidity knows no nationalistic, geographic or ethnic bounds. The same goes for dysfunctional behavior, narcissism, greed, fraud and all that.

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If you're looking for proof of that, nowhere is it more evident than in my upcoming list of the 10 worst performing companies of 2011. Sometime next week, I'm going to post that exclusive analysis and, when you read it, two things will definitely pop out at you.

First, 2011 was a banner year for CEOs to drive their iconic, big brand companies off the proverbial cliff. Second, the subsequent destruction of enormous amounts of shareholder wealth wasn't specific to any particular country or continent.

Not to tip my hand, but the list includes an American company with a German CEO, a dual citizen (U.S. and U.K.) chief executive of a Japanese company, a Spanish CEO of an American company, a couple of European companies, and a Canadian company. Okay, that last one is Research In Motion. Duh.

So the next time one of those familiar phrases starts to form in that innovative American mind of yours, remember this. The French actually learned how to cook from the Romans and Greeks. Americans taught the Japanese about quality, but they implemented it first and nearly destroyed our automotive and semiconductor industries in the process. And the next Silicon Valley might very well be in China. That's globalization for you.