I'm a fan of all things Machiavellian, the only downside, well, he's been dead for a while so I had to settle for 'The Prince' in audio, video, books, mp3 and every other way I can get my political strategies kick. I found myself being drawn to type in certain keyword phrases and came across a company called Princeton Corporate Solutions, a boutique corporate and political strategies firm working globally with political crisis management and domestically on the IPO scene.
I had the pleasure of being introduced to the CEO of this company, James Scott, while I was in Midtown, Manhattan last week. I was coming out of the Yale Club and saw a group of 10 or more consultants standing next to a Lincoln Town car and inside, there he was, on the phone and puffing the infamous Baccarat Churchill, sunglasses and completely unaware of the group waiting to talk to him when he got out of the car. I heard the name Machiavelli a dozen times in less than 60 seconds and I was hooked, I had to find out who this guy was.
After a few minutes, he stepped out of the car, the first person to greet him was an NYU student who asked him to sign her thesis paper (that's not a joke, that actually happened). He signed someone's copy of 'The Art of War' and even the box of an audio version 'The 48 Laws of Power'. All you could hear is 'Mr. Scott, where are you staying?' and 'Are you going to be speaking in the city' and so on.
He took off his sun glasses and put on his black rimmed specs and imagine my dismay when I saw he wasn't even 40 years old, handsome, exquisitely dressed and a look that could hypnotize a cobra, I had to meet him.
If you are an economic or political strategist, unless you've been living under a rock, you've certainly heard of him. He's called on by governments who need economic turnaround strategies. He's called on by publicly traded corporations for crisis management and to give his blessing to the board on their new CEO choice or bless the CEO's decision to make a move against another industry player. He works his magic when a pre public company needs to be globalized with strategic alliances to set a solid pathway to a fast tracked success. He can pick a board of directors for a new company going public that would bring a tear to the eye of any shareholder. His crisis management will shift the defensive position to a company's largest competitor. He's taken what started as hostile takeover and turned it into the most financially prosperous year his client's corporation has ever had.
James Scott has a reputation for perpetual success and the inability to lose. He is what every CEO wishes they could be and what every board wishes they could hire. You've never seen focus until you watch his eyes when counseling COO on how to grow a company by 30% in a year while cutting 15% of its workforce and shutting down 11 locations by off shoring, carefully identified partners for hard-hitting global alliances and other strategies that defy logic but seem to work every time.
After about 20 minutes things calmed down and I was accompanied by a friend who is with one of the broker dealers downtown who knew him and I asked for an introduction. He was walking down to a cigar shop down the street (one of those members type places, the name escapes me) we walked with him. During the five minute walk his phone rang a number of times and in that time I heard him speak Korean, English, Spanish and Mizo (a language spoken only in one state in the northeastern section of India called Mizoram). The phone stopped ringing long enough to say hello and get a quick intro.
I shook his hand, introduced myself and asked him "What is your secret?", he chuckled and then asked me, "What is the difference between a tactician and a strategist?" I said, "I don't know" he responded, 'Neither does anyone else and that's the secret'. After that he went down the steps to the members lounge and I've only been reading about him ever since.
It's funny. I thought I had it all together until I came across this man. I felt that I had general economics figured out and that I was on a fast paced road to success and I find myself pondering the reality that I'm 64 years old and I haven't even scratched the surface.
I had the pleasure of being introduced to the CEO of this company, James Scott, while I was in Midtown, Manhattan last week. I was coming out of the Yale Club and saw a group of 10 or more consultants standing next to a Lincoln Town car and inside, there he was, on the phone and puffing the infamous Baccarat Churchill, sunglasses and completely unaware of the group waiting to talk to him when he got out of the car. I heard the name Machiavelli a dozen times in less than 60 seconds and I was hooked, I had to find out who this guy was.
After a few minutes, he stepped out of the car, the first person to greet him was an NYU student who asked him to sign her thesis paper (that's not a joke, that actually happened). He signed someone's copy of 'The Art of War' and even the box of an audio version 'The 48 Laws of Power'. All you could hear is 'Mr. Scott, where are you staying?' and 'Are you going to be speaking in the city' and so on.
He took off his sun glasses and put on his black rimmed specs and imagine my dismay when I saw he wasn't even 40 years old, handsome, exquisitely dressed and a look that could hypnotize a cobra, I had to meet him.
If you are an economic or political strategist, unless you've been living under a rock, you've certainly heard of him. He's called on by governments who need economic turnaround strategies. He's called on by publicly traded corporations for crisis management and to give his blessing to the board on their new CEO choice or bless the CEO's decision to make a move against another industry player. He works his magic when a pre public company needs to be globalized with strategic alliances to set a solid pathway to a fast tracked success. He can pick a board of directors for a new company going public that would bring a tear to the eye of any shareholder. His crisis management will shift the defensive position to a company's largest competitor. He's taken what started as hostile takeover and turned it into the most financially prosperous year his client's corporation has ever had.
James Scott has a reputation for perpetual success and the inability to lose. He is what every CEO wishes they could be and what every board wishes they could hire. You've never seen focus until you watch his eyes when counseling COO on how to grow a company by 30% in a year while cutting 15% of its workforce and shutting down 11 locations by off shoring, carefully identified partners for hard-hitting global alliances and other strategies that defy logic but seem to work every time.
After about 20 minutes things calmed down and I was accompanied by a friend who is with one of the broker dealers downtown who knew him and I asked for an introduction. He was walking down to a cigar shop down the street (one of those members type places, the name escapes me) we walked with him. During the five minute walk his phone rang a number of times and in that time I heard him speak Korean, English, Spanish and Mizo (a language spoken only in one state in the northeastern section of India called Mizoram). The phone stopped ringing long enough to say hello and get a quick intro.
I shook his hand, introduced myself and asked him "What is your secret?", he chuckled and then asked me, "What is the difference between a tactician and a strategist?" I said, "I don't know" he responded, 'Neither does anyone else and that's the secret'. After that he went down the steps to the members lounge and I've only been reading about him ever since.
It's funny. I thought I had it all together until I came across this man. I felt that I had general economics figured out and that I was on a fast paced road to success and I find myself pondering the reality that I'm 64 years old and I haven't even scratched the surface.
About the Author:
I found some more on James Scott, CEO of Princeton Corporate Solutions , and the Princeton Youtube Site is here.
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