Hearts & Minds: When a lifetime of achievement boils down to one infamous moment

Recently at a party the conversation turned to a former business chief. By any criteria he’d done well. He’d grown the business hugely and netted considerable sums for the shareholders. Someone didn’t recognise the name. Another said: ‘You remember, he’s the man who put his wife and nanny on the payroll.’ Then they remembered.

On another occasion, sitting in a restaurant, a distinguished figure walked in. You saw people look at him. Who is that, we were asked. ‘You know, he’s the one who had sex on his office carpet.’ No matter, he’d held senior jobs before and after details of the affair emerged that forced his resignation. He, too, was forever defined as ‘the one who…’.

At another social event, a few weeks ago, a woman came across to chat. When she’d gone, a person on the edge of the gathering, asked the familiar question, ‘Who is she?’ Quick as a flash, came the reply: ‘You know, she was the one who took the driving points for her husband and went to jail.’ We had been debating the state of the economy – the woman who took the points is a distinguished economist. No matter, with that cue what followed was a somewhat awkward, nervy discussion about whether any of us had taken penalty points for our partners.

We all do it. Every day we refer to people by a simple, reductive description. We’re programmed that way, to avoid the long introduction and take a short-cut. It’s lazy, but it works - we realise instantly who is being discussed. It doesn’t just happen with labelling people. Every episode of Friends is ‘The One where…’ or ‘The One with…’. Apart from the last one, which is ‘The Last One.’ 

It can be complimentary. ‘He’s the one who made a fortune by…’. Or ‘She’s the one who founded…’. Often, it isn’t. Someone’s entire life, their whole career, may be boiled down to a few unflattering words. Moving on is extremely hard. If it appears in the media they may be persuaded to stop but realistically, only if it is untrue. No, the only real hope is time, that as the years roll by, the collective memory fades. Even then, with digital and social media, it may well resurface, it will be out there somewhere. Who knows, something good and big and more interesting may occur to eclipse it. You can but hope.

Chris Blackhurst is one of the UK’s foremost business journalists. He was previously Editor of The Independent and City Editor of the Evening Standard.