Measures of managerial motivation (the Miner Sentence Completion Scale ‐ Form H) were obtained from a sample composed of 75 chief executive and operating officers, executive vice presidents, and group vice presidents. Within this sample, 49 individuals had clearly worked their way up a bureaucratic hierarchy, and thus were congruent with managerial role motivation theory, while 26 were either the original entrepreneur or relatives of the entrepreneur. Comparisons were made with a sample of 65 managers in the same companies who, although of similar ages, had not reached the same high levels. The theory congruent top executives proved to have higher managerial motivation than either of the other two groups. These results support the hierarchic role‐motivation theory and reinforce one of its most central propositions; they also support the use of the MSCS‐Form H in the selection of managerial talent and in executive assessment.