What is the reason a seriously terrible executive is kept on at your organization?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Because “terrible” is in the eye of the beholder, and most of these people are great at managing up (with the CEO, Board, etc) and across (others in the C-suite) even if they are terrible at everything else.

Managing up vs managing down is an important concept that many people don’t understand.

[Anonymous]

The executive (who reports to the CEO) has receipts of the now-CEO sleeping with the former CEO. Now-CEO is married with a bunch of kids and a stay at home spouse, so guess how that divorce would go.

Same executive is sleeping with his (married) direct report, and now-CEO knows that, so it is mutually-assured destruction. The married direct report’s husband is the breadwinner (by a lot), so married direct report doesn’t want to rock the boat because she would lose her meal ticket.

[Anonymous]

Rainmaker that was sexiest, racist and verbally abusive to subordinates. Fired when he stopped bringing in the business and folks realized he was taking credit for the work the subordinates were doing. Oh and he was cheating on his wife with hookers which also led to his divorce.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Because “terrible” is in the eye of the beholder, and most of these people are great at managing up (with the CEO, Board, etc) and across (others in the C-suite) even if they are terrible at everything else.

+1 this

[Anonymous]

Oh also the ivy league degree holders are automatically respected even if they are horrible at their jobs.

[Anonymous]

My brother now retired was a big executive who realized early his place had lay-offs every few years and kept folks like this for that purpose. It saved him from laying off good folks.

[Anonymous]

I worked for years and years with a minority who couldn’t do the job or do her work. Others, like me, had to do it. Person would scream at meetings , scream at everyone, say anything that happened was because the staff were all racists. And through my long tenure there , it went on. And on and on and on.

I was told the federal agency wanted to avoid any discrimination lawsuits so they just accommodated the abuse and the staff had to take the abuse. It was awful.

DEI all the way.

[Anonymous]

PP. that person wasn’t an executive. It’s just an example of the most egregious example of DEI I have ever seen.

[Anonymous]

Rainmaker/brings in lots of clients. He is also a legitimately terrible human being.

[Anonymous]

Race. Or connections.

[Anonymous]

One of our least competent executives has been quietly reassigned to a role where she no longer does any public speaking; clients and colleagues alike complained that her English is extremely difficult to understand. She was hired specifically for her expertise but can’t competently convey her wealth of knowledge.

People would leave her presentations absolutely flustered and infuriated and claim they learned nothing - think continuing education-type courses/mandatory trainings.

[Anonymous]

I know a guy in leadership who makes publicly lewd comments about women, has been accused /convicted of date rape and has even bankrupt multiple companies before his current position.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Rainmaker that was sexiest, racist and verbally abusive to subordinates. Fired when he stopped bringing in the business and folks realized he was taking credit for the work the subordinates were doing. Oh and he was cheating on his wife with hookers which also led to his divorce.

So why is all that ok for our President?

[Anonymous]

I know exactly one supervisor at my agency who, at least, creates an unpleasant work environment for his subordinates.

Race is one factor for retention. On the other hand, he's actually very good at his job. Top performer among the very few.

[Anonymous]

He's a good old boy and plays a mean golf game, but is otherwise incompetent. His buddies are enablers - see it all the time with people like him who offload their work to other team members.