“You couldn’t build an AIG today,” [Hank Greenberg] explains.  Overbearing regulators, new corporate governance rules, protectionism, a failing tort system, prosecutors unleashed — these, as he sees them, are the obstacles to corporate greatness.

Wall Street Journal, April 15-16, 2006.

     Kimberley Strassel’s interview with former AIG head Hank Greenberg who was unceremoniously ousted from his position last year highlights the dramatic change in legal playing field of business.  Mr. Greenberg is not shy about his views of these changes.  He doesn’t like them and he is spending a considerable amount of money challenging them.

     Few business leaders have the financial resources a Hank Greenberg does.  They therefore have a choice to make: they can hang on to the old definition of corporate greatness spend money railing against a system that requires more checks and balances, or they recognize that the changed legal landscape is in response to perceived abuses and figure out how to successfully navigate the new terrain and achieve corporate greatness under the new rules.     

This entry was posted on Tuesday, April 18th, 2006 at 2:26 pm and is filed under Business Blind Spots, Corporate Governance, Costs, Leadership, Quote of the Day. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.