[account_taken]

How do these CEOs make the noobest mistake? Know your customer base! JC Penney was never an upscale department store. Did he all of the sudden think it would become one with a stagnant economy? Common sense. I think this guy lucky with Apple. He was just at the right place, at the right time.

[8ig8]

Apologies in advance. You may have a lot of domain knowledge that I don't know about, but...

This sounds like armchair quarterbacking. It's easy on the surface to criticize, but we don't really know all the factors that lead to Johnson's decisions. I don't think it's fair to try to boil it down so much.

It's like someone criticizing a development project without knowing the budgetary or time constraints. Yeah, it would have been better to do it _this_ way, but _that_ way assumed an infinite budget and time.

[Aloha]

Really?

Have you been in a Pennys? It's about as upscale as Dennys, and as hip as the dentist. On the other hand, it did offer consistent value and a consistent shopping experience. He tried to do in a year, what needed ten years or more to do, and failed. His failure is not unsurprising to any of us who have been in the store. Pennys, was so un-hip it almost became hip, but it rightly so had a image of dowdy women wearing housecoats shopping on a Tuesday.

[8ig8]

I have been to Penny's many times. I don't necessarily disagree with your observation of the store, the point I was trying to make is that judging the dude on the visual data we have is unfair.

I don't know the guy, but I assume he's not stupid, so if what you believe is so obvious, it must have been obvious to him too. But, for some reason he chose a certain strategy and we don't know exactly why. We don't have all the data.

All I'm trying to say is that it is easy to criticize, but I don't feel comfortable criticizing someone who knows a lot more than me in a certain area.

It's fucking hard to be CEO and I don't feel comfortable being an armchair CEO.

[reddit_clone]

What is your point? Only CEOs can criticize CEOs now?

It didn't seem like he knew what he was doing. Most people knew that he was going to land on his ass. He duly did. Criticism fully warranted, armchair or not.

[quahada]

We never have all of the facts. Criticism is an important way to learn from other's mistakes. Sometimes you have to make due with the limited data you have.

Also, it's actually very common for someone who has considerable knowledge in a certain area to be wrong. The market/technology/customers/etc can all pass them by, while their thought process remains stagnant.

[danso]

> This sounds like armchair quarterbacking. It's easy on the surface to criticize, but we don't really know all the factors that lead to Johnson's decisions. I don't think it's fair to try to boil it down so much.

Uh, are you suggesting that Johnson was forced to conduct actions that are consistent with moving JCPenney's to an upscale bracket? Because usually that kind of move costs much more money than maintaining the status quo.

It's fair to sympathize with a CEO had no options but to keep a slowly sinking ship from sinking faster. However, I when a CEO accelerates the sinking by his own initiative, it's fair to scrutinize his decisions.

[8ig8]

No, I honestly don't know anything about retail or Johnson (or the OP). I guess I just was bothered by this quoted statement:

> How do these CEOs make the noobest mistake?

To me it sounds unfair. It sounds like the OP thinks he/she could be a better CEO. That feels like armchair quarterbacking to me. (But I'm wrong if OP is Tom Brady or an expert in the field.)

[jowiar]

There's a pretty solid argument to be made that if JCP doesn't go upscale, or at least some sort of mid-scale, they're going to go kaput, because they have zero chance of winning a supply chain competition with the Wal-Marts, Targets, and Costcos of the world.