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Procter and Gamble: One of the world’s best breeding grounds for managers

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Procter and Gamble BrandsA senior colleague at work recently mentioned that Procter and Gamble [PG] recruited his daughter as a management trainee. She would work at the corporate headquarters in downtown Cincinnati, Ohio. He said, “She interviewed at General Electric [GE] and got rejected in the last round of interviews. She was very disappointed; GE was her top choice.”

General Electric’s management practices and vast managerial talent are widely recognized as one of the world’s best. Its leadership development program and the John F. Welch Leadership Center at Crotonville, New York state, receive wide publicity, especially in the print media.

Procter and Gamble is equally well known as one of the best breeding grounds for managers. Its reputation for hiring the best young talent, training them rigorously, and challenging them with opportunities in marketing, product strategy and operations is legendary.

“Many CEOs and top managers in corporate America are Procter and Gamble alumni,” I explained to my colleague that his daughter out to be thrilled she joined Procter and Gamble. “So, she has a chance, haan?” replied my colleague, ending the conversation.

Procter and Gamble Alumni

From memory, I compiled a list of current corporate leaders that, at some point in their careers, worked at Procter and Gamble. Here it is for your reference.

Virus on iPods: Apple blames Microsoft Windows

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On Wednesday, Apple’s iPod support website acknowledged that a small number of video iPods were infected with a Windows virus. In addition to describing the scale of infection and providing instructions to remove the virus, the website blamed Microsoft Windows for the glitch.

“As you might imagine, we are upset at Windows for not being more hardy against such viruses, and even more upset with ourselves for not catching it.”

Apple’s “114,000 viruses? Not on a Mac” advertisements have lately targeted Windows users to ‘Get a Mac’. Presumably, someone at Apple [AAPL] believed that blaming Microsoft Windows for viruses on the iPod could extend its ‘Get a Mac’ campaign. The outcome is a cheap shot at the competition.

The iPods were apparently infected with the virus at one of Apple’s contract manufacturers. There is no reason for Apple to be “upset” at Microsoft for not being more hardy against such viruses.” Microsoft [MSFT] has invested significant resources (money and talent) fighting hackers and improving its software development process. As Jonathan Poon of the Microsoft virus-scanning group pointed out on his blog, Apple should blame its own manufacturing system.

“It’s not a matter of which platform that the virus originated. The fact that it’s found on the portable player means that there’s an issue with how the quality checks, specifically the content check was done.”

Apple should also blame hackers, who were creative enough to get malicious code embedded on an Apple product while it was connected to a Windows machine on Apple’s manufacturing line.

The take-away lessons: (1) possess a healthy respect for the competition, and, (2) blaming the competition without cause constitutes poor taste.

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