Ode to wisdom: when trouble hits, we bring in the veterans to clean up the mess.

One of the findings for this year's Route to the Top took us by surprise. Among the top 100 companies, the percentage of CEOs aged 60 or older rose to 35 percent in 2003 from 28 percent in 2002--returning the number to 1998 levels (see chart). The recent headlines support this trend; troubled companies are calling in retired leaders to lead them back to relative safety. Boeing's appointment of Harry Stonecipher, 67, and Delta Air Lines' pick of Gerald Grinstein, 71, are the most recent examples.

True, it could be something of an anomaly; no one would argue that 2003 wasn't an especially tough year for American business. Right now, it pays to be risk averse. But the current attitude is a far cry from the go-go days, when investors and analysts spent the better part of three years enamored with younger and younger go-getters, cheering them to lead the companies they started in their basements to ever greater heights. In the youth-obsessed dot-com era, media pundits regularly fawned over 20-something "gurus" while breathing down the necks of older CEOs, wondering loudly when they'd let go the reins and shuffle off to the golf course. Their insights and advice--particularly when they warned of an inevitable implosion--sounded irritatingly rational and grandfatherly. Youth was rewarded, in America's boardrooms and in its markets, causing some older veterans of business, like Frank Lanza, then 68 and CEO of aerospace and defense company L-3 Communications, to bemoan the mandatory retirement of talented executives, as a "uniquely American tragedy."

That changed, of course, with the market, with the crash of the dot-coms, with the exposure of illegal goings-on inspired by an era of excess. When the proverbial excrement hit the fan at some of the biggest companies, investors clamored not for fresh-faced, fast-talking software salesmen nor for technology whiz kids from the West Coast. Instead, they sought out the kind of wisdom and integrity, and certainly credibility, that can only come from years of hard won experience.

So do these numbers mean that in coming years, age and experience will trump youth and the dynamism and fresh thinking that often come with it? Probably not. And, of course, they shouldn't. With all the challenges U.S. companies face keeping up with global competitors, the latest technology and the demand for fresh, new ideas, they can't afford to hang on to the past. As the economy stabilizes, board members will again let younger executives take their shots at the top, agree CEO headhunters Tom Neff of Spencer Stuart and Peter Crist of Crist Partners.

"A lot of this is generated by external pressures, the market grasping for credibility," says Crist. "If the markets were stronger, you would see boards being more comfortable taking risk and saying, 'We have a 45-year-old COO who's never been in the chair, but we have great confidence in him. Let's do it.'" At the moment, however, the gap is still too wide at many companies between where their ponies are and where they need to be. To be sure, one of the biggest lessons of 2003 is the lack of succession planning and frightening dearth of bench strength in U.S. companies (see Thought Leader, page 14).

But another lesson emerges as well: If it's true that we cannot live in the past, then neither can we afford to ignore it. Those who have weathered the storms--including this most recent one--have a unique perspective that has no expiration date. The bearers of history's lessons have much to teach current and future CEOs--who might just want to write it down in their PDAs before they forget it.

AGE

Age before beauty?

Percentage of top 100 CEOs age 60 or older

1998  35%
2000  30%
2002  28%
2003  35%

Note: Table made from bar graph.