The Problem of Personality

I have been working in IT for almost 30 years now and years ago I noticed something that I still can't wrap my puny brain around: Why do most executives display similar personality behaviors?

Let me start by saying that most executives I have worked with have been very able businessmen. (And let me also say that I have worked with many female managers but only male executives. I didn't cause it, it's just the way it has been. If you know of a lady executive (VP or higher) in an industrial company, feel free to add a comment on whether or not my observation holds for women as well.)

Let's call my prototypical executive the Proto-E. In my years I've seen every personality type the human race has to offer at all levels of the business; introverts, extroverts, shy, gregarious, smart, not-so-smart, easy-going, stubborn, you name it. When I get to Proto-Es though the behaviors tend to coalesce around a certain type.

Proto-Es usually have calm personalities. They speak deliberately. They do not often make jokes. They do not often respond to jokes made in their presence. They are almost always pleasant. (In fact, I have seen them behave very pleasantly even when delivering scathing criticisms.)

And they are almost always forceful and direct.

I can only remember one Proto-E I would call indecisive but that was only when he was out of his comfort zone. By training and experience he was an engineer and when speaking of engineering, he was knowledgeable and decisive. When pulled into Accounting or IT or general operations he was much less so. In general, though, he was a good executive because he had a good staff in the areas in which he was weak and this was probably by design.

Another behavior I've noticed is that Proto-Es rarely talk about themselves. Most of us will talk about ourselves until we've bored our companions to tears. The sound of our own voices is sweet, sweet, music to our ears. Proto-Es though; well, it's not so. If I ask a Proto-E how his wife and kids are doing then I'll get a polite response, "fine, thanks". And that's about it.

Now here's my question. Where is the cause-and-effect here? From time-to-time I've had illusions that I could aspire to executive-hood. I believe I still can but only if I owned my own business. I do not believe that I can as long as I'm employed by someone else in a corporate environment. No board of directors is going to accept my quirks, my dry sense of humor. And I'm in no mood to change them. I like my quirks.

But do Proto-Es become executives because they have Proto-E personalities or do they adapt and adopt Proto-E personalities as they move up the corporate ladder? The only way I could personally know is to know a Proto-E who moved up the food chain from the time he or she was only a gleam in the board of directors eyes. I've never known one that long.

So, having rambled too long on this for the moment, I'll come back to the question later. Why do Proto-Es dominate the executive suite?