Internationalism at the top

As more and more U.S. companies expand their international operations, they are turning increasingly to men with overseas experience to fill the top executive jobs. Last week Chas. Pfizer & Co., the nation's largest ethical drug company, followed the overseas route to executive leadership. As its new president and chief executive officer, it picked John J. Powers, 52, the chief of its international operations for the past 14 years. Powers takes over as Pfizer's boss from John E. McKeen, 61, who will retain his position as chairman.

McKeen's 16-year term as president will be a tough act to follow. Under his leadership, Pfizer grew from a $47 million specialized drug firm in 1949 into a highly diversified company whose sales reached $480 million last year. Powers, however, has already demonstrated his talent in an important supporting role. In 1951, impressed by Pfizer's growing number of unsolicited foreign orders--, which accounted for $10 million annually in sales--he persuaded McKeen to allow him to begin building an overseas operation. "I figured that if we could do $10 million worth of business without seeking it," says Powers, "why not seek it and make more?" Powers' search has been spectacularly rewarding. Today Pfizer has 58 plants in 30 countries outside the U.S., sells its drugs and products ranging from baby powder to plastics in more than 100 countries.

Foreign sales last year reached $223 million, nearly half of Pfizer's total.

Personal Contact. Powers established each foreign subsidiary as an autonomous operation fully responsive to local needs, largely staffed and run by local workers and executives, and subject only to financial control and general guidance from Pfizer's Manhattan headquarters. As a result, most Pfizer products are ideally suited to the areas in which they are manufactured and have won wide acceptance, especially in developing nations. In Nigeria, Pfizer has two plants and is building a third to make animal feed for the country's expanding agriculture, also produces badly needed Pharmaceuticals and molded plastics. "There is a little bit of the Peace Corps in us," says McKeen, "and we get a profit from it too."

As president, Powers hopes to continue Pfizer's rapid diversification "through research, acquisitions and geography," plans to concentrate at first on becoming more familiar with Pfizer's U.S. operations by visiting each of the 25 U.S. plants. "Personal contact is important for any job," says Powers. After his appointment last week, he drove to Pfizer's Brooklyn plant, where he shook the hands of all 2,100 employees.

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