Posts Tagged ‘Cisco’

The New York Times Sunday Business Section interviewed Cisco’s CEO John Chambers today. Chambers mentioned smart advice he got from former GE CEO Jack Welch on what makes a great company was genuinely true. When Chambers was facing a major business impediment, Welch told the networking CEO that the makings of a great company are “taking major setbacks and overcoming those.”  Chambers thought he had already hit several roadblocks but Welch said that what he meant was not just an obstacle but a “near-death experience.”  This is why leaders often say that the wasting a crisis is tragic. I have my fingers crossed that the near-death experiences we've seen over the past 18 months are just a sign of better things to come. As I always say, reputation can't be left up to the roll of the dice. They need to be managed and often come from ashes.

   Our research on online reputation management found that leaders worry a lot about what current and former employees might reveal online about their organizations. Not sure they thought about employees who are offered a job but have not exactly started. One such employee at Cisco may have lost his job in a matter of 140 characters. This poor fellow twittered about having received a job offer from Cisco and deciding between a “fatty paycheck” and commuting to a job he’d hate.  It is unclear if Cisco rescinded the job but we do know that Cisco contacted him pretty quickly and soon afterwards he set his Twitter account to private.  There is now a CiscoFatty.com site to keep this Internet tale alive. As an article on this nefarious event said, this fellow violated the cardinal rule of the Internet which is to never write anything that you wouldn’t want your mom or boss to see. Reputations have been ruined by less than 140 characters.

My favorite line in the article was this: “The Internet is not your BFF.”