Well I guess the damage control is going full speed at AOL in the wake of the CEO summarily firing an employee during a morale building phone call.
On Friday, Armstrong fired Abel Lenz, a creative director for AOL’s
Patch local-news business, in front of other co-workers and 1,000
employees listening in on a conference call to discuss changes at the
unit, including layoffs and site closings.
In a memo to employees on Tuesday, obtained by Bloomberg News,
Armstrong wrote, “I am writing you to acknowledge the mistake I made
last Friday during the Patch all-hands meeting when I publicly fired
Abel Lenz. I am the CEO and leader of the organization, and I take that
responsibility seriously.”
He pounded his chest "I am the CEO!!!!" and at least he is "acknowledging the mistake" he made. He isn't sorry about it or regretted the mistake he is simply acknowledging it. He also did a little CYA tap dance.
In the memo, Armstrong wrote that this wasn’t first time the staffer had
“recorded” a confidential meeting. ”As you know, I am a firm believer in
open meetings, open Q&A and this level of transparency requires
trust across AOL,” Armstrong said in the memo. “Internal meetings of a
confidential nature should not be filmed or recorded so that our
employees can feel free to discuss all topics openly. Abel had been told
previously not to record a confidential meeting, and he repeated that
behavior on Friday, which drove my actions.”
Well if it was such a confidential meeting why didn't he simply have his secretary or someone have everyone put their cell phones and cameras in a box until the meeting was over. She could have just met them at the door to whatever conference room they were using for the webcast and took their recording devices until the meeting was over. The CEO would have been the first person to do it to show how important it is to not be recording these events. Instead he fired someone on the spot like the kind of plutocrat CEOs that Americans hate.
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