Two articles this weekend discussed looks in politics and entertainment. Catherine Bennett in the Observer asked, “What it is with male politicians and their obsession with looks? Couldn’t they work rather than work out?”

She cites Blair’s scrupulously maintained tan, balanced diet and faultless body mass index, jogger Sarkozy’s spartan regime and poseur-in-chief Berlosconi with hair transplants and cosmetic work. All examples of an “age of image-obsessed personality politics….but no one expects a senior economist- Mervyn King, for instance -to jog like Boris”.

AA Gill writes that “almost every medium for entertainment or edification is myopically lookist, sizeist and pulchritudinist… even opera singers can’t be fat anymore”. He then contrasts this with the success of  Andrew Marr, “who has a face for radio and a voice for mime”.  He succeeds with a punchy delivery and because he is “bright and perceptive and just a touch iconoclastic”.

Marr is not a bad role model for business.  Energy, exuberance, excitement and passion will outperform any beauty formula!