Brokerage Training For The Ages: My Days With Ross Perot

See that chart? I lived through that as a rookie broker with a firm called duPont Glore Forgan, a U.S. securities powerhouse owned by H. Ross Perot. Just to the left of that incredible dip in 1973/74 it was thereof that I found myself sitting in a large, round waiting room in the executive offices of E.D.S. (Electronic Data Systems) in Dallas, Texas. In the room with me were about ten people who had applied for a sales position with the firm’s brokerage arm – previously F.I. duPont. Pretty well everyone, except yours truly, was wearing a dark suite, white shirt, tie and black shoes. My brown check suit with tan shirt and half-boots in brown was clearly a standout in the white-knuckled gathering. We were all there as supplicants to be interviewed by the firm’s new owner and Wonder of Wall Street, Ross Perot.

As I sat awaiting my turn at the altar, I watched as body after body exited their interview every fifteen minutes with a perplexed and questioning look on their faces. They were on their way to the down elevator to face the chief recruiter, a former G.I. named Ron Salma who had told all interviewees that they would report back to him to hear Ross’s decision. In the majority of cases it was bad news. My name was called by a junior secretary who took one look at my garb, another look at her wristwatch and with raised eyebrows marshalled me down executive row to meet with the legend himself. Glancing in this office and that along the way, I was suddenly surprised by a five foot six figure with brush cut hair who extended a welcoming hand with “Mr. Curry, I’m Ross Perot, thanks for coming in today”. Hell, I remember almost running him over thinking where did that high, squeaky Texas drawl come from.

In Ross’s very large office, sitting in front of his very large desk and staring at a very large painting of an American Eagle, I spend the next forty-five minutes discussing just about everything with the newest Wall Street titan and never once did my over-stated mode of dress come into the conversation. Details vanish over time, but what I do remember was how he summed up the meeting – “Brian, I would consider it an honour if you would join the firm”. After politely accepting I made my way down to meet with the recruiter who was clearly surprised by the change in communications and while shaking my hand informed me that Ross had authorized a $1,000.00 increase in my training salary. God Love America!

So, that preamble leads to the story behind this missive. Post the interview and the hiring I entered into a six month training programme in Los Angeles, California. In terms of time, money, content and detail this was and to this day is clearly the most extensive training experience in the securities industry. Let me give you a peek into daily life of a duPont rookie, aka “Perot’s Tigers”.

1) By 8:00AM you would have arisen, kissed your spouse goodbye for the day, arrived at school and read the wall street journal cover-to-cover.

Lesson Learned – Commitment

2) The morning trainer (Norm) would begin the day by identifying a particular article in the Journal and then ask for a comment from……”You, Mr. Curry”. God help you if you missed that piece!

Lesson Learned – Be Prepared

3) Dress code and appearance were always on the docket. A blue, grey or black suit was mandatory and was worn with only a white shirt, a thin, dark tie along with traditional brogue shoes. Haircuts, at a minimum, occurred every two weeks and you were clean-shaven with the possible exception of a simple moustache.

Lesson Learned – Do not ever offend clients or colleagues with an appearance that even might be objectionable.

4) Participation in class activities such as presentations using only voice intonation as your strength and leaving your arms by your side, not in pockets. Joining Toastmasters and attending same meetings was mandatory as well as compulsory volunteerism for charitable local L.A. causes. Role playing and subsequent critiques by your peers was pretty well a brutal, daily ritual.

Lesson Learned – Practice and then practice some more

5) The acceptance to discipline was a required trait, not an acquired habit. It was constantly in the air as a means to survival in that it was publicly known, from day one, that an attrition factor of 33% was built into the course.

Lesson Learned – Accept, recover and move forward

6) Ushering your family into the family firm. Spousal support went beyond a request. Stress in the classroom environment was pretty well a given and was always there. Friday, at the end of the day, each recruit would anxiously check their mail slot to see if there was present a pink note which stated – “See Norm”. That usually meant that there was a car waiting outside, parked with your belongings and your spouse to take all to the airport. Even better was the invitations to the spouses to attend a pleasant gathering at the school in the evening. They then showed up to a reception hosted by Norm who “requested” that they do a short, filmed interview telling Ross how enthusiastic they were at being THE support factor in this new life’s venture. The screenings were then sent off to Dallas for “review”.

Lesson Learned – Totally involve and inform your family for the road ahead in the securities business

Last Pieces

You really had to be there! Certainly there are more tidbits to comfortably fill a small book on that six months in L.A. A boot camp for sure, but surviving it pretty well insured you could survive anything that came your way in the business. (See back to the chart). You may think that a hard-drive model such as that would not be culturally acceptable north of the border. I submit that you would be wrong because the lessons I learned from that experience are still valid today. Sadly, most of the training facilities in the large, Class A firms in Canada have disappeared and along with the ever-increasing expectations of those firms the survival factors for today’s rookies (L.O.S. under 5 years) are small. Clearly, the succession plan of the future will fall out of the banks’ over-stuffed vaults. (tellers, clerks and in-house financial planners)

– In my interview with Ross he gave to me a rule to live by. “There is no drawback that you will encounter, with the exception of a family tragedy, that you cannot overcome and get yourself back on track within twenty-four hours”. Pretty well a truism.

– Perot and duPont Glore succumbed to the market at the end of 1974. Markets have their own truisms, eh?

– While training days may be on the decline there are always lessons to be learned in the daily turmoil of up or down markets; having lived through both a number of times I can show you a better way to avoid the costly errors one is apt to encounter.

Brian L. Curry