For a metro with a million people in the MSA, Birmingham seems to have a good bit of activity on the CEO front. First, you had the HealthSouth situation with Richard Scrushy being exposed as the king who did whatever he wanted on the company dime (including ordering plastic surgery for his friends outside of HealthSouth and acting like being a Hollywood agent was a hobby), then saying "Me? I didn't know 5 straight CFOs I hired were committing one of the biggest corporate frauds in history".
Now we have Chuck Jett. Not the same type of deal as Shrushy by any stretch of the imagination, but topical from a CEO standpoint.
Who's Chuck Jett you ask? Jett is the former CEO of Birmingham-based technology firm Emageon, a hot software startup that went public a few years back and ultimately struggled from a results/shareholder value perspective. The company was red hot in the Birmingham area for many years, then fell on hard times once it went public. Chuck Jett was the CEO of Emageon during the roughest portion of the downside, and resigned in 2008. Jett is widely panned locally for approving decisions like forcing the relocation of his entire engineering team from Birmingham to Wisconsin as part of a post acquisition plan where Emageon was actually the acquirer.
As a result of the downslide, some former employees decided to create a site called "Dear Chuck Jett" where they could wax poetic about their feelings towards their former CEO.
Now you know where this is going. Here's a sampling from Dear Chuck Jett:
"Dear Chuck "Yoda" Jett,
"I once heard you defend that all employees are replaceable by quoting Charles De Gaulle, stating "The graveyards are full of irreplaceable men." Besides the fact that the quote is "The graveyards are full of indispensable men." and the fact that you had the audacity to quote a figure like De Gaulle, I firmly believe that you (like De Gaulle) did not believe that the quote applied to you or ever understood that it was a double-entendre. Maybe you just liked it because it came from another Chuck.
The questions that I have for you:
Are you now dispensible as you approach the graveyard of "your" company? How could that be so, given that you are the self-proclaimed "founder" of this great enterprise? Could it be, perhaps, that the only employee truly dispensible was, after all, you?
Are the graveyards of Emageon full of people that you thought were dispensible, but were not? Have you been able to replace those that you felt were dispensible, treated as such, and no longer have to support you? Perhaps, upon reflection, you were simply wrong?
- A dispensable voice from the grave"
How about another one?
"I look back on your heartfelt goodbye to your personal secretary when she left the company. You pointed out in an all hands meeting that she was such an asset to the entire company and that each and every one of us would miss her and owed her our gratitude.
Meanwhile the company was bleeding engineering talent at an alarming rate, often just disappearing without a word. This level of prioritization skill certainly got us to the position we are in today.
You are an inspiration to us all."
We've got time for one more:
"Dear Chuck Jett,
I can’t decide which memory or encounter is best remembered. Was it the time...
- ...we rode together in the elevator to an All Hands meeting and you awkwardly acknowledged me, but didn’t speak?
- ...we were washing our hands in the company restroom, but you weren’t sure I was an employee (probably didn’t matter either way)?
- ...some fellow employees and I saw you at lunch and we stopped by to say hi, but you seemed uncomfortable – like we were about to mug you?
- ...you came to Hartland office for Company Thanksgiving luncheon in ’07? The company wasn’t doing well. Instead of walking the halls and talking to the troops to offer encouragement, you stayed in your office until “time for the show,” came out, did your shtick (you know, offering encouraging, heartfelt words), then returned to your office. Ahh, that could be the winner.
Yikes. Welcome to the new world of transparency, whether you want to provide it or not. If that doesn't make you walk around the offices a little bit more as a leader, I'm not sure what will...
Hi Kris,
I was surprised as you were about how much poetry and vitriol Chuck Jett inspired! Well, OK, having worked for the guy for several years, I guess I was really only surprised about the poetry.
I started the blog as a lark and thought I'd get maybe a handful of letters from some of my fellow Chuck Jett survivors. But as the weeks went on and the emails kept pouring in, I was torn between being amused and even more mortified than I was when I worked for the guy! From former employees to current employees, from Birmingham and Madison to Hartland, Ottawa and Winter Park, from the worker bees like me to the bigwigs... Chuck Jett seems to have no limits to his power to alienate.
How can a leader be so insulated from the reality of how he is perceived (and the toxic effect he has on his employees), and still call himself a leader?
Posted by: Dear Chuck Jett | May 30, 2009 at 03:06 PM
Jett and his cronies were in it for the Money and then the figured out just about where their peak was, they cashed out and ran. The company was nothing more than a money maker with no intention of ever being anything larger than it was.
Posted by: A dispensible voice | July 17, 2009 at 10:36 AM
Long live the CEOs!
Long live the CFOs!
Long live the CTOs!
Long live the CIOs
Long live the CHrOs
Long live the CxOs!
Death to middle class trash!
Send all American jobs to India!
Send all American jobs to China!
Death to middle class trash!
Long live the CEOs!
Posted by: The Executive | September 05, 2009 at 07:33 PM
I used to say "Chuck Jett" is the sound that a shotgun makes just before it blows a company to pieces. I watched Jett and his cronies walk in and completely destroy a very brilliant company that had awesome potential. He cared not, as he floated down from the sky in his golden parachute.
I sure hope Karma is real.
Posted by: Another dead Emageon employee who will never forget | March 27, 2012 at 12:27 PM