As AOL Prepares To Downsize Patch, CEO Fires Employee During Meeting

An anonymous reader writes "AOL is closing or plans to sell nearly half of the 900 'hyperlocal' news websites operated by its money-losing Patch Media subsidiary (TechCrunch is also owned by AOL). Hundreds of staff layoffs are believed to be imminent. AOL acquired Patch in 2009, soon after ex-Googler Tim Armstrong took over as CEO; Armstrong was also a co-founder of Patch. During a tough conference call last Thursday Armstrong told Patch editors: 'Something at Patch has been missing for some time and that's leadership – leadership with a capital L'. Armstrong then demonstrated his grasp of Donald Trump's management style by firing an employee during the meeting for taking a picture. At 1:18 of the NY Post's sound clip from Jim Romensko: 'Leaking information Patch isn't going to bother me. I'm not changing direction'. At 2:00: 'Abel [Creative Director Lenz], put that camera down. Abel, you're fired. Out.' Armstrong later explained that 'The reason I fired Abel is I don't want anyone taking pictures of this meeting' and that, much like a sports team, AOL couldn't afford to have people 'giving the game plan away'."

Comments

What a dick

[Anonymous Coward]

I hope he is treated similarly

Re:What a dick

[girlintraining]

I hope he is treated similarly

If I had stock in AOL, I'd be making the call to sell it all. Now. The reason is as old as humanity itself: True genius doesn't run around telling everyone "I'm a genius!" anymore than true sanity runs around saying "I'm the sanest one here!" If you're pointing out your virtues to others, you have none to speak of.

Or, to quote the Tao Te Ching, "The best leaders go unnoticed by the people. The next best are loved and praised by the people. Then there are those who are feared by the people.
Lastly there are those who are despised."

Guess which one this guy is? He's a shit leader, to enamored with his own self-importance to be useful to an investor. Sell. Sell. Sell now. Sell.

Re:What a dick

[Tough Love]

Result of searching for "aol growth prospects" on finance.google.com:

Your search - aol growth prospects - produced no matches.

Re:What a dick

[Anonymous Coward]

No matter how badly AOL falls, the CEO will ride his golden parachute while the plebes below him get the shaft.

Re:What a dick

[VortexCortex]

There is a humble way and an arrogant way to point out ones own virtues. Since you are into philosophy I'll use an example of right speaking (from the Buddhist 8 way path). If someones life is on the line, and you are more competent than the person or people trying to save them, then it would be not only bad, but possibly deadly, not to point out your virtues. Pointing out your virtues is not in and of itself arrogant or egotistical. One can have true humility and still recognize their own strengths and share the knowledge of their existence with others.

Speaking as a Scientist: That's bullshit. You see, Rational people realize that even the most wise can be foolish at times, and that even the ignorant irrational child has good suggestions sometimes. This is why we weigh the merit of the idea instead of the man. Screw your vitures, that's irrational BS, buddy.

If the widely accepted wisest and most virtuous person told you to leap into a volcano, and you did so without evaluating the idea itself then you are a fool.

So, If you think someone is about to make a terrible mistake and you have information that may change their mind -- eg: "The Yogi is Senile!" -- then give it to them even if you are a serial murderer and they a saint.

It's the value of the message not the messenger that matters.

To help AOL he should have fired himself!

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm sure that meeting really helped staff morale!

Re:To help AOL he should have fired himself!

[Noughmad]

The firings will continue until morale improves!

Re:To help AOL he should have fired himself!

[Em Adespoton]

The problem is that those most able to leave are the first to do so. The highest talent goes first, leaving the duds that would have a hard time conning a interviewer a second time in a row. Its a sorting process that doesn't pay off for the company.

Interesting theory, but not quite the entire picture. I've been "last one out" in a company, not because I wasn't talented, but because I had a misguided feeling of responsibility to the other people involved -- the employees and the customers (and to some degree the shareholders). Would I do it again? Probably not. However, we made sure that the duds left first (and learned that duds often have impressive skills at getting hired). You see, people who aren't very good often hop from job to job, building up an impressive CV, and always leaving before people at the top realize they're all talk and no substance. These people usually stay at a company for 9 months to 2 years, and while there, latch on to some project that is already started and showing promise, often taking over from the high talent who got it started. They leave before they run the project all the way into the ground (or at least before anyone else realizes it) and are able to list the project as a "success" on their CV.

THESE are the people who are toxic to the company as a whole; duds who just aren't very good (at their job, getting hired, etc) can still be used as effective resources, but the guys who actually play the confidence HR game can destroy a successful company before they realize what's happened.

Just my 2 cents.

He was the Creative Director

[jebus187]

Was he not supposed to take pictures? He was the creative director; maybe he was just being creative.

Re:He was the Creative Director

[Anonymous Coward]

Abel was taking the picture for the company blog. About a minute earlier in the conference call, Tim said:

"
I don’t care what the press says, I don’t care if people leak information. I’ve already lived through that at AOL [...]

and again:

"
I also want to clear up the fact that leaking information or anything around Patch isn’t going to bother me, doesn’t bother me.

then:

"Put that camera down, Abel. You're fired. Get out."

Every other excuse theory in this thread is shot down from by the facts of the recording.

Patch is already dead

[linuxwrangler]

They killed it months ago. Now they are just dragging the corpse through the streets instead of giving it a proper burial.

Last year there was an actual reporter posting actual news relevant to and about our town. Readers posted comments - sometimes hundreds on a single article. There were lively discussions about school issues, traffic safety and other local issues with generally one to three new articles every day.

Then they announced "exciting upgrades." The look and feel of the site went from OK to awful. Our local reporter has been "reassigned to a regional area." The local news is an irregularly updated mish-mash of cut 'n' paste police blotter info posted well after it has already been available on Nixle, reposts from other news sources (and not very local), and "reporting" consisting of things like a brief listing of the city-council agenda followed by an "article" saying "Were you at the meeting? What are your comments?" And still they sometimes can't get any news posted for days. Really?

They have added lots of "sponsored" Patch localities advertising Planes, Smurfs and the like.

The "local" reporters are now, if you look at their profiles, all over the country and making errors in articles that just make them look like idiots to anyone actually living here. Reviews and articles about places that closed a year or two ago do not make for credibility.

Much of the supposedly local news is just repackaged national stats. "How is unemployment in YourLocalTown compared to the rest of the country?" and the like. Other stuff is somewhat local looking blog stuff that turns out to be identical on all the sites.

It's sad. The site used to be fun and interesting. Too bad they couldn't make it a successful business.

Re:More accurately:

[Anonymous Coward]

Dude left Google to hatch his own scheme.

Dude stayed on after AOL bought his gimmick company.

Dude lashed out because he's still stuck holding the bag.

Not that the guy with the camera was being in any way professional, but if this guy wants to make sports analogies, his scull has split down the keel and he just tossed one of the rowers overboard.

Actually, he has a history of taking pictures of internal conference calls and posting them on the company Intranet. This wasn't an aberration - it was literally his thing. That he was fired for it puts the CEO in a bad light, not the camera operator.

Never just one cockroach

[EmperorOfCanada]

In my experience there is never just one cockroach. This sort of short tempered thing is rarely done in the public eye. Even if the guy were an serial abuser he would still keep it hidden from the public. Thus I suspect that he fits a long pattern of CEOs who do this sort of public stress related nonsense only as they are cracking under unimaginable stress. Rarely this stress is caused by their own imminent firing as that is usually hidden from them until the trap door is sprung. This sort of stress is caused by really bad numbers. Numbers so bad there is just no spinning them. Numbers that not only say things are bad now, but numbers that say, there is no recovering from this. Normally these CEO types are able to delude themselves through screwing with the numbers but at a certain point the numbers are rotten no matter how much tempura you dip them in.

I saw this just before Air Canada did their bankruptcy, I saw this before Nortel went busto, even Sun before its long hard slide started having upper management go a bit off.

My favorite one was a tiny corner store when I was a kid. We went in and a friend of mine each had around $1.50 I paid for something but my friend asked how much a certain product was, The owner said, "$1.70" My friend said, "Oh that is 20 cents more than before" and put it back. The guy started screaming "Are you begrudging me 20 f*****g cents?" He then picked up a bat from behind the counter and chased my friend out of the store. The next day there was a big red notice on the door saying that the locks had been changed and that he could get back in his store when he paid the last 6 months rent.

So when I see CEOs acting insanely I see that stressed-to-the-max store owner from all those years ago. So if I were playing the stock market I know I would bet hard against AOL.

Or maybe the guy is a dick 24 hours a day and this just leaked out for the world to see. I'm betting.... both.