After a 37-year advertising career at Young & Rubicam, Peter A. Georgescu is finding time to promote a few causes that areas dear to him.
Mr. Georgescu, 66, who once managed well-known campaigns like the “Softer Side of Sears,” retired as chairman and chief executive of Young & Rubicam in 2000, but he says he is now in “the most wonderful chapter of my life.”
It is an apt metaphor because his book, The Source of Success (Jossey-Bass, $27.95) is being published this month. The book aims to explain what Mr. Georgescu views as the two major challenges facing America: economic competition from the emerging economies of China and India and a need to foster more creativity within American companies.
“The only way this nation can compete with those that produce high-quality products at a lower price is by generating ideas that build a special relationship with consumers,” he said. “Everyone has buildings and technology; those are commodities. The only leverage able asset in the future will be creativity.”
Any profit from his book will go to a charity called Better Chance, which finds bright children in some of the nation’s poorest neighborhoods and helps them to attend outstanding high schools, including private prep schools like the Phillips Exeter Academy in New Hampshire.
Mr. Georgescu, an Exeter alumnus, received a bachelor’s degree in political science from Princeton and an M.B.A. from Stanford before starting at Young & Rubicam in 1963.
He said he counted himself lucky to have gained admission to Exeter in 1954, when he arrived in the United States at the age of 15 from his native Romania after spending seven years in a Communist labor camp.
“I had been cleaning sewers, and I spoke little English, but someone gave me a chance,” he said, “I want to do that for other young people who are disadvantaged.”
He also volunteers as a board member of the New York Philharmonic. In the business world, he holds the title of chairman emeritus of Young & Rubicam and serves as a director for several companies.
He and his wife, Barbara, live in Manhattan and have a son and three granddaughters. He rises at 6 a.m. most days to run five miles, partly along the East River.
“That’s how I torture myself,” he said.
1. From the first 3 paragraphs we know that Mr. Georgescu is ____.
2. What are Mr. Georgescu views about the major challenges facing America?
3. According to Mr. Georgescu, the future of economic competition lies in ____.
4. We may infer from the context that “Exeter” (Line 1, Para. 6) is the name of ____.
5. The best title for the passage may be ____.