Money Talks, Bullsh*t Walks by Ben E. Johnson

Author:Ben E. Johnson
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Penguin Publishing Group

SAM’S MEA CULPA

The Zell road show continued in early February 2008, as he made highly publicized stops at the Los Angeles Times and the Orlando Sentinel. Particularly memorable was a verbal exchange between Zell and Sentinel photographer Sara Fajardo, which quickly became the stuff of YouTube legend. At the end of Zell’s final answer to Fajardo’s question, he uttered, “Fuck you.” Because the camera was focused only on Zell, it was not apparent what Fajardo had done to elicit the response—Zell says she turned her back on him before he was finished with his answer.

According to Zell spokesperson Terry Holt, he was offended by Fajardo’s tone, not her questions. Holt noted that Zell had tried to reach Fajardo over the following weekend to apologize “if he offended her in any way.” Fajardo left the paper several months later to become the communications officer for Latin America and the Caribbean at Catholic Relief Services in Washington, D.C.

The perception in media newsrooms from coast to coast was quick and sure—Zell was not only autocratic and crass, but the new boss was truly out of control. At times, it seems that Zell knows, or at least acknowledges, when he has personally crossed the sometimes invisible line between deprecation and demagogue. In one e-mail he explained that his raw language was deliberately intended to direct attention to Tribune’s financial plight and the need for continued cultural change. But he also issued a “mea culpa” to anyone who thought he had gone a bit too far.

Soon after what became known simply as the mea culpa, L.A. Times editor John Arthur expounded on Zell’s comments with his own brief note to the editorial staff. In it, he downplayed Zell’s remarks and reminded his minions that they should not follow his example when it came to the use of colorful speech in the newsroom.

Impersonal e-mails did little to quell the internal contagion that spread to the next stop on his road-show tour. In a town hall-style meeting with employees in Tribune’s cavernous Campbell Hall auditorium on the seventh floor of Tribune Tower, Zell again clearly made the sense of economic urgency known, in equally colorful language. In essence, it was a “damn the words” moment:AUDIENCE QUESTION: A number of people at the company, especially women, have been deeply offended by some of the statements you said in other places and other venues. I know you did the mea culpa, and I think we all know the history, but I wondered if you would address that here, because it’s taken so long for people, and again especially women, to arise in the profession, and then they have felt personally disrespected by some of your comments.

ZELL: First of all, I would not take back anything that I have said. I wouldn’t take it back not because I disrespect women. As a matter of fact, if you look at my history, I have promoted more women to senior executive positions in my career than almost anybody else I know about. My number-one person for many years was a woman, an extraordinarily competent woman.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.