It’s always entertaining to peel the layer of the onion back on large, public companies and the way people do business at the senior executive level. Certainly there is a level of crazy that is required to maintain in order to run a large company; the pressures of managing all of those spinning plates at one time has an unavoidable side effect of creating the occasional off-the-wall neurosis. It’s the reality of being in charge at that level… you need to harness the random bursts of stress, rage, euphoria and feelings of insecurity into one tightly wound package that could explode at any minute.
While many CEOs choose to deliver their crazy in private, really large companies with big public figures allow their insanity to break free of the shadows and run around in broad daylight. Google’s Eric Schmidt has a whole novel of weird behavior that gets paraded around Silicon Valley and Jack Welch from General Electric would have legendary tantrums and firing binges. What’s the thing both have in common? Google’s massive financial war chest that Schmidt has assembled and Welch rising GE’s value by 4000%. If you’re successful, people will put up with your crazy.
Or you’re AOL and you decide to fire someone over a public conference call.
Such is the story of AOL CEO Tim Armstrong who fired Creative Director Abel Lenz during a conference call with roughly 1,000+ employees listening in. Not a premeditated event, it all went down with Lenz was apparently trying to photograph Armstrong during the meeting. Armstrong was in the middle of trying to put a happy spin on downsizing the number of sites in its local news network from 900 to 600, and by accounts was getting visibly annoyed at Lenz shooting photos. Finally, Armstrong told Lenz to put the camera down and in the same breath told him he was fired. To be precise, this is what the 1,000+ people on the conference call heard:
“Abel — put that camera down right now. Abel! You’re fired. Out!”
The call then went silent for roughly five seconds when presumably there were some uncomfortable hand gestures and objects thrown across the room. Then the call resumed as Armstrong continued forward with the business plan.
Abel Lenz later tweeted “No Comment” from a New York bar.
Good times, AOL.
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AOL CEO fires employee during conference call
It’s always entertaining to peel the layer of the onion back on large, public companies and the way people do business at the senior executive level. Certainly there is a level of crazy that is required to maintain in order to run a large company; the pressures of managing all of those spinning plates at one time has an unavoidable side effect of creating the occasional off-the-wall neurosis. It’s the reality of being in charge at that level… you need to harness the random bursts of stress, rage, euphoria and feelings of insecurity into one tightly wound package that could explode at any minute.
While many CEOs choose to deliver their crazy in private, really large companies with big public figures allow their insanity to break free of the shadows and run around in broad daylight. Google’s Eric Schmidt has a whole novel of weird behavior that gets paraded around Silicon Valley and Jack Welch from General Electric would have legendary tantrums and firing binges. What’s the thing both have in common? Google’s massive financial war chest that Schmidt has assembled and Welch rising GE’s value by 4000%. If you’re successful, people will put up with your crazy.
Or you’re AOL and you decide to fire someone over a public conference call.
Such is the story of AOL CEO Tim Armstrong who fired Creative Director Abel Lenz during a conference call with roughly 1,000+ employees listening in. Not a premeditated event, it all went down with Lenz was apparently trying to photograph Armstrong during the meeting. Armstrong was in the middle of trying to put a happy spin on downsizing the number of sites in its local news network from 900 to 600, and by accounts was getting visibly annoyed at Lenz shooting photos. Finally, Armstrong told Lenz to put the camera down and in the same breath told him he was fired. To be precise, this is what the 1,000+ people on the conference call heard:
The call then went silent for roughly five seconds when presumably there were some uncomfortable hand gestures and objects thrown across the room. Then the call resumed as Armstrong continued forward with the business plan.
Abel Lenz later tweeted “No Comment” from a New York bar.
Good times, AOL.
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About The Author
Travis
He has a twenty plus career in product creation, which includes writing and describing an endless series of bad decisions.