The day my mentor set out to skin me alive — but not before he took on his own management team first

Of all the bankers I’ve written about over the past 40 years, Don Fullerton, chairman and CEO of Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce from 1985-1992, made the greatest impact on his employees.
In 1990, in the first of two widely distributed internal memos, he referred to a state of affairs within the bank that he called “middle-management mush.” That phrase still stands among the most memorable ever uttered by any CEO. Many managers, he wrote, spent their time doing little more than acting like a “sponge or insulator” in order to stifle “initiative, creativity and innovation.”
Fullerton’s seven-page document, dated Feb. 13, 1990, was sent to nearly 5,000 bank officers. In it, he went on to say that any attempts at internal improvements had been made all the more difficult because the bank had been “managed in a weak ‘country club’ fashion for many years.”
His followup memo in April heightened the condemnation. Fullerton said that he had become even more upset because the response to his blistering February missive came mostly from lower-level employees. “From the 230 vice-presidents and above, I have not received the feedback I would expect from you, the most critical driving forces of change in our organization.” He demanded they conduct tougher employee performance reviews and told them to tie those reviews to pay increases in order to get everyone’s attention.
But there was something even more unusual than tough wording from the top. Fullerton also labelled the memos as “not confidential,” as if he wanted to make waves beyond the bank. He got his wish. Both were leaked to the Globe and Mail. The result was a lengthy story in an August edition under the headline, “CIBC chairman blasts staff.”
Like those folks dubbed as “middle-management mush,” I also had occasion to feel the harsh sting of Fullerton’s withering words. I began writing about financial services when I was at Maclean’s from 1978 to 1982. After working as a freelance journalist followed by a stint as bureau chief for the Financial Post in Washington, D.C., from 1989-1993, I was back in Toronto with the Financial Post where I continued to write about the banks and their management, among other topics.
One balmy May evening in 1996, Fullerton and I both happened to attend a cocktail party at the home of mutual friends. I found myself standing with Fullerton on the backyard patio as part of a conversational bouquet. Unsmiling, and with a strong, jutting chin, he looked downright foreboding as he stared at me across the circle of eight people.
I had never met Fullerton so was taken aback when, in a disparaging tone, he set out to skin me alive in front of witnesses. “McQueen, I can’t begin to tell you how much you’ve got wrong about banking over the years. I don’t know where you get your information, but it certainly couldn’t have been from anyone who worked at the banks. Do you just make things up?”
“Well,” I replied, all sweetness and light, “I’d be happy to sit down with you and go through these mistakes you claim I made and see what it is you’re talking about.”
Fullerton would have none of it. He looked skyward as if in exasperation, and said, “Do you know how long that would take? Do you think I’ve got that kind of time to spend with the likes of you?”
I licked my wounds, let a couple of weeks pass, and then decided I would follow up on my offer to hear his complaints. After all, the worst that could happen was another diatribe. I called and offered to buy him lunch. He accepted immediately. And so began a most unlikely friendship that grew during our annual lunches over almost 15 years. During that time he told me a lot about banking as well as many other aspects of his life including all the good work he was doing as a director of the Li Ka Shing (Canada) Foundation.
We didn’t always see eye-to-eye on issues, but we agreed on more topics than either of us could ever have imagined. And we always had stimulating conversations, the likes of which, unfortunately, are all too rare between a business journalist and a banker. Early in 2011, I saw him briefly and he said, “Call me for lunch.” I was busy with other matters and didn’t get back right away. That May, he died. I missed my opportunity for one last lesson from my belated mentor, who, despite what he said at that party, ended up taking the time to teach me quite a lot. And it was my turn to buy lunch, a fact that he would likely have had very much in mind when he urged me to give him a call.