Being three score years and 10 doesn’t necessarily mean you have become any wiser

LAST WEEK, two top fund managers were engaged in an ugly set-to in a court in London. One was John Duffield, founder of New Star Asset Management, and the other Patrick Evershed, who was suing for constructive dismissal.

Mr Evershed told the court that his ex-boss was a bully who “would prowl around the floor on a regular basis with his jaw jutting out and emitting growling sounds and call us morons and criminals”.

But the court also heard that Mr Evershed was no pushover either. On two occasions he lost his rag, and on one admitted to having called the company’s joint chief investment officer a “vile little runt”.

Reading this story in the FT last week gave me great pleasure. First, this tale of rough and tumble in the Square Mile was the perfect antidote to the epidemic of stories on recession and meltdown in Euroland. So long as top people in the city are continuing to behave in an uncivilised fashion, the world as we know it isn’t coming to an end, after all.

This story has an interesting twist to it. Almost all the cases of alleged bullying in the city feature a man old enough to have amassed some power – ie not all that old – and a young defenceless person, usually a woman.

But Mr Duffield is no young financial Turk, high on testosterone and playing at being a master of the universe. He is 72.

Mr Evershed is of a similar vintage. Between them they have almost a century of experience of managing other people’s money, something they have done with more success than most.

The idea of two old geezers having a fight is vaguely comic. It was the central joke in the film Grumpy Old Men,in which Jack Lemon and Walter Matthau shout at each other over a fence and Lemon says: "You kicked my ass, I kicked yours, and I'll do it again."

But this legal ass-kicking between these two real-life geezers isn’t merely funny – it’s rather important. It proves that all our assumptions about older workers are plain wrong.

Being three score years and 10 doesn’t necessarily mean you have become any the wiser – or any the calmer. In fact it shows that oldies can be just as aggressive as workers a third of their age.

One of the defining qualities of the financial sector – despite everything – is a sort of invincibility. A sense that making enough money means that rules of politeness don’t apply and you say and do exactly what you like.

Last week, one of the city blogs asked how much this rough, tough stuff mattered: whether it was okay for senior figures to call their staff morons, or, as allegedly happened at one big hedge fund, for a boss to prowl the floor smacking a baseball bat into his hand.

The consensus in the comments below was that it was fine, even rather admirable. “If you want molly coddling, work on the sell side,” one person wrote.

But that’s nonsense. Such stuff may be okay, or not remotely okay. It depends on context.

The simple utterance of such words as “moron”, “criminal” and “vile little runt” in the office aren’t decisive. Used properly they can be exhilarating, a relief from the extreme mealy-mouth syndrome present in corporate life in which even mildly negative words are avoided for fear of doing damage to people’s precious self-esteem.

There is a colleague at work who I frequently call a moron – and he usually returns the compliment.

It’s sort of a joke and cheers us both up. And even though I don’t think I’ve ever called anyone a vile little runt, I rather like the sound of those three little words put together like that, and have stashed the phrase away in my memory bank for future use.

If and when I bring it out, I will do so with care. To call someone a VLR can make a lot of sense, but only under the following three conditions: first, the VLR must not be within earshot; second, he must deserve it, and third, you must be talking to people likely to agree with your diagnosis.

Such strong language works like swearing in the office. It is great to let off tension between peers, but a catastrophe across a power divide. To call one’s boss a vile little runt or a moron might be exceedingly satisfying in the heat of the moment but is exceedingly unwise.

To call your underling that is an even worse idea: even if it doesn’t destroy their motivation (as surely it will) it could land you in court. (Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2011)