Power Ambition Glory

February 16, 2009
Forbes
magazine’s editor and CEO collaborates with classical scholar Prevas to examine the lives of the ancient world’s greatest leaders, including Julius Caesar, Hannibal and Alexander the Great, and the lessons they have for today’s business people. Interspersed throughout are 20th- and 21st-century examples of leaders whose careers parallel those of the ancient leaders, men like Alfred Sloan, who, like Augustus consolidating the Roman Empire, transformed the motley collection of automobile companies that was General Motors in the early 1920s into the world’s largest corporation. Unfortunately, the historical studies rest uneasily alongside the contemporary business cases, which are often tenuously related to the ancient stories. Worse, the entire work rests on the unsubstantiated claim that businesses are like military empires, and the lessons drawn are often banal; for example, from the story of Hannibal’s daring winter march over the Alps to take the Romans by surprise, the authors suggest we should “think outside the box,” respond to attacks and pay attention to detail.