But this one won’t garner the glut of headlines that CopyKaavya’s been getting. Still, the fact that Raytheon CEO William H. Swanson actually cribbed some of his rules in “Swanson’s Unwritten Rules of Management” from a book published over sixty years ago by engineering professor W.J. King.
Swanson’s reaction was to move fast to apologize, according to the Boston Globe. “I regret that over the course of the years and in the process of compiling the ‘Unwritten Rules,’ any reference to Professor King’s work (“The Unwritten Laws of Engineering”) was not properly credited,” he said in a statement.
Will Swanson’s book, which gained cult status among business titans like Jack Welch and Warren Buffett, be completely discredited as a result? Watchdogs think this is likely (with one likening the book as “a Gucci bag that’s not really a Gucci”) but Raytheon’s lead director, former US Senator Warren B. Rudman, was more confident. “[Swanson has] got just too much good will with the customers, the board, and the employees,” Rudman said.