Okay, you decide whether the following story is an indicator of the outcome of the 2008 Presidential race:
In
Providence Rhode Island on Monday I asked a room of 60 CEOs - many of
them in the media and telecom business - whether they believed the
outcome of this presidential election would matter. We had been talking
about the nature of global and macro uncertainty. These days provoke a
lot of worry about how bad things might get. So how should good
corporate leaders react? After all, the Dow had been down almost 580
points before recovering a couple of hundred points higher. And this on
top of an 877-point decline last week.
Show of hands? Yes. The outcome of this election matters. Unanimous.
Then I asked for another show of hands - without suggesting support for one candidate or another.
How many in the room thought McCain/Palin would win?
Not a single hand raised. This caused a ripple of bemused or perhaps nervous laughter.
Then
someone called out, "How many are going to vote for McCain?" and the
questioner himself raised his hand, looking around for support. About
a fifth of those in the room raised their hands, several of them
tentatively.
Is this an official poll? No. A focus group?
Well, perhaps, if you wanted to focus on CEO opinion in the media. (Do
we think such a distinguished crowd would tip toward Democrats? I would
think - hmm, not necessarily at that level of the enterprise.)
I
realized that I was not prepared for the outcome of my impromptu poll.
This unanimous result fell into the category of "the unthinkable,"
which had been one of the discussion topics. With so many unthinkable
things happening in the world (Freddie and Fannie taken over, Bear
Stearns gone, Lehman gone, WaMu gone, Merrill absorbed, AIG saved),
what others might business leaders need to take into account in their
planning?
Their answers included terrorism on US soil,
capital shortages, and internal strife in the US economy akin to that
of the 1930s, when people pulled up stakes en masse and left
California, to cite one example.
But closer at hand?
A landslide victory for Obama. That's what the "poll" said.
Comments