BusinessWeek's survey of 2,500 U.S. managers and executives found that the most competitive are the highly paid, the young and men.
Among the highly paid, 30% would fire a friend. Nearly half of people under 35 like the idea of laying off the bottom tenth of performers in a company every year. 66% believe that a modestly talented but extremely competitive person is more like to get ahead where the other 34% thought an extremely talented but uncompetitive person would. Women? Only 41% think talent is a key quality for winning in business (versus 49% for men); 72% name "self-confidence" as important (versus 66% for men). Both men (59%) and women (58%) think "integrity" helps people win in the business world.
33% think Microsoft is the most competitive company in the world with 42% believing that the most competitive nation is the U.S. 40% of those surveyed check their work email once a day or more when on vacation. 21% of those making $150K and up work 60 or more hours a week.
Which of the following things would you do to get ahead? The survey said:
72% of men and 80% of women would go back to school.
62% of men and 53% of women would take overnight business trips once a week.
23% of men and 21% of women would accept an assignment in China or India.
23% of men and 27% of women would hire a performance coach.
Source: BusinessWeek, August 21, 2006