Don't talk about retirement to Richard P. "Dick" Simmons, the former chairman of the board of Pittsburgh-based Allegheny Technologies Inc.
Simmons, at 75, is just too busy being involved in Pittsburgh's cultural institutions, economic-development efforts and his family's philanthropy in the arts, education, music and medical research to while away the hours at home in Sewickley Heights, or lie on a beach soaking up the sun.
While he no longer needs to work the 12- and 14-hour days in the boardroom since retiring in October 1999, Simmons maintains a full schedule. He is chairman of the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra board of directors, a board member of the Carnegie Museum of Natural History, chairman emeritus of the Allegheny Conference on Community Development and a director and former chairman of the United Way of Allegheny County.
In his "spare" time, he oversees the R.P. Simmons Family Foundation and the R.P. Simmons Charitable Trust, which supports the Pittsburgh Foundation. He remains loyal to his alma mater, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he is an emeritus trustee, a position he moved into when he reached 75.
From his office on the 29th floor of PPG Place, Simmons said he believes he has an obligation to give back to the region where he has lived for 53 years and raised his two children with his first wife, Dorothy, who died of a lung disease in January 2001.
He remained here after her death. He met and married a widow, Virginia C. "Ginny" Moyles, and the two have a combined family of five children and 21 grandchildren.
"My financial success was made here in this region. I decided Pittsburgh was my home and is my home," Simmons said. "This is where I ought to repay the community for my unusual luck. There is a fairly long list of educational and philanthropic organizations which the Simmons family has supported."
The Simmons family's support of and investment in the community can be counted in the millions of dollars, thanks to his vast holdings in speciality-metals producer Allegheny Technologies, and its predecessors, Allegheny Teledyne Inc. and Allegheny Ludlum Steel Corp. When privately owned Allegheny Ludlum went public in May 1987, Simmons' 6.7 million shares had a market value of $190 million, the Tribune-Review reported.
Before Simmons sold his stock last year in Allegheny Technologies, he was its largest shareholder, according to a Securities and Exchange Commission filing. Simmons sold more than 750,000 shares of stock valued at about $15.3 million in 2004, and sold about 917,000 shares at prices ranging from about $33 to $50 in late 2005 and this January, SEC documents revealed.
"As I tell my kids, your obligation and responsibility is to do good things after I'm gone, and they will. They're great people," Simmons said of his son, Brian Simmons, and daughter, Amy Sebastian.
His willingness to commit his financial resources, as well as his time and energy, has made a large impression on those who have worked with him.
"He's been a great investor in the community," said Rick Stafford, who served as executive director of the Allegheny Conference on Community Development, when Simmons was chairman of the board in the 1990s.
"The community has benefited greatly from him. Dick Simmons is the penultimate example," of involvement by a corporate leader, Stafford said.
At the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, where Simmons is serving his second stint as chairman, his leadership has proved invaluable, said Lawrence Tamburri, president and chief executive of the symphony. Simmons was chairman in the 1990s and returned to the leadership role n the 2002-03 season.
"Dick epitomizes volunteer leadership at its finest. He's passionate about the symphony," Tamburri said.
According to William Meyer, president and chief professional officer of the United Way of Allegheny County, "Dick Simmons is the quintessential board leader for major nonprofits ... in extraordinarily challenging times for us."
Carnegie Mellon University's Kenneth B. Dunn, dean of the Tepper School of Business, puts Simmons' activism in the community in a historical perspective that Pittsburghers can understand. Simmons teaches a course about corporate executives at the Tepper School.
"Dick Simmons represents the heritage of this community - the industrial and corporate leaders who historically have been generous supporters of our region's cultural, arts and educational institutions. Dick is doing what (Andrew) Carnegie did. He's doing what the Mellons did," Dunn said.
Simmons understands the importance of supporting world-class cultural institutions such as the Carnegie Museum of Natural History and the Pittsburgh Symphony, said Bill DeWalt, director of the natural history museum in Oakland. The R.P. Simmons Family Fund donated $5 million for the museum's 8,000-square-foot special exhibit space, which allows the museum to play host to the best traveling exhibits in the world, DeWalt said.
"He is a CEO's best partner to bring about the transformation required for the survival of these important community institutions," Meyer said.
Humble beginnings
The future corporate leader grew up in Bridgeport, Conn., during the Great Depression in the 1930s. Living on the homefront during World War II, the family endured rationing for gasoline, meat and butter. Like millions of American families, the war touched their lives: Simmons' oldest brother was in the Navy, serving on a cruiser on convoy duty in the Atlantic Ocean and a destroyer escort in the Pacific Ocean.
Simmons learned a strong work ethic by laboring at his father's service station. After his father had a heart attack when Simmons was a high school sophomore, he left school a few hours early each day to help the family business.
Knowing that Simmons liked math, a high school teacher encouraged him to apply to MIT, Simmons said.
Simmons said the school is where he received one of the best lessons of his life.
"I learned that about a third to a half of the students were smarter than I was," said Simmons, who graduated from an inner city high school. "I found that if I worked hard enough, I could overcome some of the advantages other students might have had."
Simmons graduated in 1953 from the Cambridge, Mass., school with a degree in metallurgy. Allegheny Ludlum offered a job as a research metallurgist at its stainless steel plant in Brackenridge for $338 a month .
Simmons worked at Allegheny Ludlum for six years before becoming a quality-control manager at Latrobe Steel Corp. He moved to Republic Steel Corp. in Canton, Ohio, before returning to Allegheny Ludlum in 1968, where he became vice president of steel manufacturing. He moved into the president's office in 1972.
Simmons became chief executive in 1980, and then led a group of key managers and private investors who bought Allegheny Ludlum from Allegheny International Inc. in December 1980, thus avoiding being caught up in Allegheny International's subsequent bankruptcy. With financing from George Tippins, whose company supplied equipment to steel mills, it was the second-largest leveraged buyout at that time, Simmons said.
In 1987, Simmons took Allegheny Ludlum public once again, then retired as president and chief executive in May 1990 but retained his post as chairman of the board.
Simmons engineered the $2.25 billion merger of Allegheny Ludlum with Teledyne Inc. of Los Angeles in 1996, which resulted in the formation of Allegheny Teledyne.
Simmons returned as chief executive and president in 1997. He retired as president and chief executive of Allegheny Teledyne in October 1999, a month before it was renamed Allegheny Technologies, but remained chairman of the board until May 2000.
"I consider myself, if not the luckiest man in the world, one of the luckiest people in the world, because I've lived through these tremendous technology changes and was faced with a lot of opportunity, like leading the buying of the company, " Simmons said.
Simmons is proud of the fact that, with the exception of Carpenter Steel, Allegheny Ludlum was the only stainless steel company that survived that entire period.
From the perspective of the United Steelworkers union, Simmons' management team was fair, said J. Roy Murray of McCandless, a retired director of collective-bargaining services for the Pittsburgh-based USW.
"We only had one strike, which lasted 69 days. We usually reached an agreement before the contract expired or had extensions," said Murray, who negotiated four contracts with Simmons' management team.
Pushing development
While leading Allegheny Ludlum, Simmons became involved in the Allegheny Conference on Community Development, an economic-development organization that strives to improve quality of life in the region.
The conference was at the forefront of establishing the Regional Asset District, the Compact 21 legislation and referendum on a tax for a new baseball park for the Pittsburgh Pirates and new stadium for the Pittsburgh Steelers. The Alcoa Building in Downtown was transformed into the Regional Enterprise Tower.
When the Working Together Consortium, of which Simmons was a chairman, identified the need for venture capital to help start-up companies, Simmons created Birchmere Capital with a $20 million investment.
Education initiatives
Teaching a course about the responsibilities and perspectives of a chief executive gives Simmons a chance to have an effect on future business leaders studying at Carnegie Mellon.
"The decisions that CEOs make determine the culture of the company, if they're there for any length of time. Everyone looks up to see what the CEO says and, more importantly, does. Ethics do not filter up; ethics filter down in an organization," Simmons said.
Simmons offers advice some of his students have said they got tired of hearing.
"You only know what you're made of when you have to look the tiger in the eye," such as when you're faced with an ethical decision that could cost you your job, cost a promotion, cost a lot of money, Simmons said.
Simmons also is on the board of the Extra Mile Education Foundation, which helps disadvantaged students get a good education.
In his free time, Simmons likes to read, play golf, garden and travel with his wife. The couple plan to follow the Pittsburgh Symphony when it goes to Greece and the United Kingdom in August and September.
Simmons has no timetable for winding down his involvement in so many of the region's cultural institutions.
He offered a bit of wisdom from an old Pennsylvania Dutch proverb: "We get too soon old and too late smart."
