Sportsmen talk about having "career windows" – brief moments when everything comes together and they have an opportunity to win at the highest level. For a gymnast or a volleyballer that moment may come only every four years with the Olympics and their window can so easily be shattered by injury or illness or even just a bad night's sleep.
The same is true in Formula 1, where the greatest driver of his generation can remain a million miles from a world championship if his team produces a weak car. To win a world championship not only must the driver be in form but also the car – and that can make for a very small window to climb through.
Success in the business world can be just as fickle. Executives may work an entire lifetime for a large corporation but their opportunity to grab a senior position may come along only once. If they miss a promotion to the next level of the corporate hierarchy, executives may find themselves overtaken by the next generation of bright young things and their window can close for good.
Unlike an Olympian, a businessman's opportunities usually arrive unexpectedly so there is little chance to prepare. Some may not even realise that their once-in-a-lifetime window is upon them until it is too late and the moment has gone. It is the uncertainty of a company's fortunes that make these career opportunities so random: a big project may be struggling and a new manager is brought in to revive it or a new product may fail and take down the executive who championed it. As a result, a major factor in getting to the top in any company is luck.
Another difference between a corporate career and a sporting career is that the most talented do not always win. In a big corporation it often pays to keep your head below the parapet because if you are too vocal or have too many smart ideas, you might become a threat. This is not always the case and I've met plenty of truly brilliant business leaders but there are probably more who, I suspect, have little more going for them than being a safe pair of hands. When economies and companies are growing, having a lucky but average chief executive is not a problem because even a chimpanzee could run a multinational during boom times. The problems start to emerge when things are not going well.
When companies are struggling you need brilliant, farsighted and innovative people in charge, not someone whose main talent is being in the right place at the right time. This economic downturn has already seen a number of reputations shredded – not least in the banking sector where supposedly brilliant financiers have been revealed as charlatans (or crooks in some cases).
Sir Fred Goodwin, the former chief executive of the Royal Bank of Scotland, at one time the world's fourth largest bank, is now ridiculed in the UK after his over-reaching ambition nearly caused the collapse of the entire institution. Sir Fred's chairman, Sir Tom McKillop, has fared little better. Sir Tom was previously the chief executive of AstraZeneca, the drug company, and I thought he was pretty average then. His failure to lead the board at RBS has finally exposed him.
Last week Peugeot Citroen, the French carmaker, fired its chief executive Christian Streiff after it became apparent to everyone that he did not have the skills to lead the company – especially the diplomacy needed to survive in French business circles. A similar problem undid Streiff when he was appointed chief executive of Airbus prior to the Peugeot job – he lasted just 100 days at Airbus.
Another to be finally exposed by this economic crisis was Rick Wagoner, the head of General Motors. The Obama administration effectively terminated Wagoner's career last week when it made his departure a condition of any further government aid. The bureaucrats got it right: Wagoner has looked leaden footed at GM since he arrived in 2000 – seemingly running one crisis behind the current one – and he did little to create a new vision for a once-great company.
Many more senior executives will be humiliated by this downturn so now is the time for ambitious executives to prepare for their Olympics. There are career windows opening around the world – let us hope that the recruiters value talent over luck this time around.
- The author is business correspondent of The Times of London