Staying the Course

Surveys the lives of successful businessmen and tries to determine the reasons for their long-term effectiveness

This refreshing, readable study by Weiss ( Marital Separation ) tells how 85 self-respecting and respected upper-middle-class American men aged 35 to 55 achieved responsible professional and community positions despite the inevitable frustrations, stresses and some less foreseeable cases of mental, alcoholic and marital problems. As important to their success as innate personal strengths, contends the author, were the men's acceptance of traditional standards of peer behavior and their willingness to divide life into three main and interdependent components--work, family and community, with work fundamental. Except for certain adjustments (to accommodate a wife's outside employment, for example), the author anticipates little basic change in the underlying structures of his subjects' lives, with work and the work community remaining the controlling factors.
Copyright 1990 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Weiss here examines men who do well in their work and who, no matter what else happened, "stayed the course." His concern is to explain why and how they were able to do it. He began by interviewing 80 men, 35 to 55 years old, in upper-middle-class occupations and living in upper-income settings. After considering the nature of their lives--their activities, relationships, goals, and stresses--he then examines their internal experiences to discover what motivated them to meet their obligations year after year despite life's setbacks. He discovered an underlying structure: work, in which these men established social place and self-worth; home, marriage, and children, which provided emotional and logistic support; and friendships, which exacted loyalty. Weiss effectively exposes the myth of successful men as dispassionate victims or exploiters of society. The interview excerpts are engrossing and moving at times. Recommended for public and academic libraries.
- Joseph Accardi, Triodyne Safety Information Ctr., Niles, Ill.
Copyright 1990 Reed Business Information, Inc.