CEO of Norfolk Southern fired over "consensual" relationship with subordinate

Originally published at: CEO of Norfolk Southern fired over "consensual" relationship with subordinate - Boing Boing

4 Likes

he won’t be getting the generous exit package he was looking forward to

13 Likes
2 Likes

I assume that impunity is a hell of a drug; and tends to degrade decision making increasingly broadly over time; but I’m always a bit surprised that people in these sorts of situations seem to be so bad at following the “if you kept the small rules, you could break the big ones” cues.

It’s not like I’d expect good behavior from someone who knows that poisoning little people and keeping the labor proles in line is both more or less legal and generously compensated; but, precisely because that’s so, it seems weird that they’d be willing to risk doing something that can get them written up(whether because they just slip up or because Ancora or friends are making a pretty modest investment in PIs) when much the same thing done outside the company would be a probate and family court issue at worst.

2 Likes

I suspect this is the corporate PR/propaganda approach of never admit errors. If he was fired because the company caused a massive disaster, that brings attention to Norfolk Southern being incompetent, not maintianing their trains, endangering people, and ruining environments. If he’s fired for personal conduct 6 months later, it’s easier to maintain the lies about the company.

11 Likes

In a world where the world’s richest man is having multiple children with an employee on his payroll it’s good to know that, at least at some companies, inappropriate personal relationships with subordinates are still frowned upon.

11 Likes

I won’t link to the paper, but the NY Post article included this uncharacteristically informative contextual nugget:

“In May, activist investor Ancora Holdings attempted to take control of the company, winning three board seats, but failed to fire Shaw as CEO.”

Looks like the story also involves some non-consensual screwing.

2 Likes

Spill a bunch of chemicals into a river via easily prevented accident: Bonus

Bang your coworker: Fired

WTF?

3 Likes

This topic was automatically closed after 5 days. New replies are no longer allowed.