Work Daze

I don’t have an MBA, but I do know that when it comes to business
performance, there are only two possibilities -- profit or loss. It’s the
same at home. When you don’t have enough income to cover your outgo, you are
operating in the red.

But not on Wall Street. Big brokerage firms and giant investment banks have
been running into trouble lately. The financial geniuses who manage these
companies have been sinking gazillions into subprime mortgages. As result of
this spending spree, they have literally lost billions of dollars. Only when
you’re a bank, you don’t have a big, embarrassing loss. You have a “write
down.”

To my shell-like ears, a “write down” doesn’t sound like a financial
disaster. It sounds like something you do at a tea party. And the big
financial firms would have indeed done better if they were having a tea
party. As “The New York Times” reported recently on the subject of Morgan
Stanley, there is “intense speculation that Morgan Stanley might announce a
write-down next month of $2 billion to $4 billion. And it follows in the
wake of market-rattling write-downs of at least $12 billion for Citigroup
and $8.4 billion for Merrill Lynch”

What happens to an executive who “writes down” eight to twelve billion
dollars? In the case of Citigroup and Merrill Lynch, they get sent packing.
That only makes sense. What doesn’t make sense is that what they pack is
millions of dollars in severance pay – at least 150 million in the case of
E. Stanley O’Neill, the canned CEO of Merrill Lynch. [The CEO of Citigroup
hasn’t negotiated his settlement package yet, but perhaps he can find
comfort in walking away with his walking papers and vested stock holdings
valued at $94 million on top of the roughly $53.1 million in pay he took
home in the last four years.]

Think about it – hundreds of millions for achieving “write downs” of
billions. What would they have given these guys if they had been successful?
The key to Fort Knox?

I point out the shabby shenanigans on Wall Street not simply to ridicule a
ridiculous situation. Let’s think positive here. In the decline and fall of
these big time CEOs is a real opportunity for thee and me. If you think it’s
strange that individuals smart enough to command top jobs make a total hash
of their situation – and their companies – consider a real oddity: it’s
apparently a problem to fill these, highly lucrative top spots now that the
current crop of bozos are gone.

“Thin talent pool for top Wall Street jobs” reads a headline on the front
page of “The Wall Street Journal,” which goes on to report that “credit
turmoil has claimed two scalps on Wall Street in a week – and exposed the
shortage of talent for the biggest jobs in finance.”

Now, just because you couldn’t balance your checkbook with the help of a
super-computer, don’t fret. “Boards at both Citigroup and Merrill are likely
to look outside their firms for successful candidates,” the Journal reports.
So, you see, your lack of financial experience will not put you out of the
running

“Even veteran executivesS. may be short of technical expertise to figure out
the mess,” continues the Journal as it scans the landscape for candidates.
In other words, if you did know anything about finance, these companies
wouldn’t want to have anything to do with you.

But let’s focus on your positive qualities, like your good looks and sense
of style. One critical function of a CEO these days is being the public face
of a global enterprise. And who better than you to wear expensive designer
clothes and fly around the world in a corporate jet, dining at the finest
restaurants, and staying in the most luxurious hotels as you mix and mingle
with other corporate superstars?

[All this travel means you may miss critical episodes of Dancing With the
Stars, but don’t worry, you can write a TIVO into your employment contract.]

At the end of the day, it is entirely possible that you will screw up your
sinecure as CEO of Citigroup and totally bomb as boss of Merrill Lynch. But
even if you do nothing at all, you can feel good in knowing that your write
downs aren’t as bad as your predecessors. And if this doesn’t make you feel
better, that severance check for $150 million should help.