Standing Tall at the Top

Roger Birk, chairman of Merrill Lynch & Co., stands as tall on the job as in his profession. Birk presides over the largest U.S. brokerage house from a brown walnut stand-up desk that he uses for everything from reading mail to signing multimillion-dollar deals. He acquired the desk ten years ago to help relieve the agonizing backaches that plagued him after long hours in a chair. Those pains are gone now, but the desk has stayed. Says Birk: "I find it pleasant and more practical than normal desks, and even tension easing."

Birk is just one of the current crop of top corporate executives who prefer to think on their feet. George Shinn, chairman and chief executive officer of First Boston Corp., a leading investment-banking house, has been a devoted stander for twelve years. Shinn, a Merrill Lynch alumnus who also had backaches, believes that tall desks are simply an outgrowth of evolution. Says he: "We crawled and walked on all fours before standing, so the upright posture is the most natural." Both Shinn and Birk are following in the tradition of Edward Allen Pierce, a Merrill Lynch founder who worked standing up until he was 90. Now several of Shinn's colleagues at First Boston have acquired the habit.

Xerox Corp. also has its share of officers who do their desk work standing. Chairman C. Peter McColough has used a stand-up desk for two decades, and a severe back problem led President David T. Kearns to get one a year and a half ago. Wayland Hicks, a Xerox vice president, works from a high desk that he can lower.

The taste for tall living has not given much lift to furniture firms since most executives have their desks custom-made. Shinn sketched an antique schoolmaster's lectern that he came across in New England, and had a carpenter copy the design. A specially built stand-up desk may cost $4,000 or more.

Stand-up executives still keep sit-down desks in their offices, but they use them mainly for meetings. Some, like Fenwick Crane, chairman of the Family Life Insurance Co. of Seattle, avoid them as much as they can. Asked when Chairman Crane used his, his secretary, Mimy Fisker, replied, "To read the Wall Street Journal. "

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