Court Ordered, Jeffrey Skilling (Enron Exec) Goes to Jail 12-15-2006
Ex-Enron Chief Executive Jeffrey Skilling will spend the next 24 years in prison! So much for excessive corporate greed and defrauding investors. It is said that Skilling plans to appeal his conviction.
In the Enron October 3, 2006 press release:
Enron Distributes Approximately $3.4 Billion To Creditors . Enron Corp. today announced its twelfth distribution to creditors of Enron Corp. and its affiliated Debtor companies (collectively, 'Enron').
Today’s distribution to holders of allowed general unsecured claims and allowed guaranty claims (collectively, “Creditors”) totals $3,371,700,000, consisting of $3,337,300,000 in cash and shares of Portland General Electric Company (“PGE”) stock valued at $34,400,000. Since November 2004, Enron has returned $9,396,900,000 to Creditors in twice-yearly distributions, in April and October, as well as in “catch-up” distributions paid on an interim basis every two months.
Our mission going forward is to bring to settlement or trial the remaining litigation with those institutions which assisted in the downfall of Enron, to liquidate the remaining assets held for sale, and to continue to pursue a course which maximizes distributable value to Creditors and improve upon the returns to date.
Founder of Enron Kenneth Lay while awaiting his sentencing, died before he could be brought to trial. Known as a close friend of President George Bush, Bush called him Kenny Boy. Lay’s estate is still liable for damages resulting from claims against Enron.
This makes me think of personal responsibility, respect for self and others. If these two men had kept their self respect, they would not have allowed either themselves or others to influence their behaviors or the companies actions. There would not have been fraud, thousands of people would not lose their jobs, nor investors millions of dollars.
A company president is the person at the top and ultimately responsible for the entire company and its employees. If there is a problem generally they know about it before it gets to the legal stage when lawyers are called into do their work. Indeed, corporate greed comes in all kinds and sizes. A problem might not necessarily be out in front of peoples noses so to speak, but many times it is really the elephant in the living room which no one wants to talk about. Elephants tend to grow bigger, a normal size room can’t handle an elephants growth, nor large egos.
If you have good channels of communication then you don’t necessarily have to worry. When you have to deal with ubiquitous egos, and bullying, which may not always be transparent, these things can be elephants within themselves. They can explode within a company if not contained within the living room/office walls.
A company needs to be empowered from within. If your constant is dealing with a back biter and egotistical outbursts which take up much time to resolve, if it ever gets resolved, then a company can be on the downslide. Sometimes it means that people will have to be let go in order to have real growth. Everyone needs to respect themselves and their leaders in a productive manner. Outbursts of temper or vitriolic with no regrets, apologies, or changes to those programs or people offended is not an option. Too many people get pissed off when that happens and it is detrimental to all concerned.
Some people call it tough love. I call it a respect for everyone's path to growth, even though it may be hard to go through. There are some communication problems that you just have to go through, there is no way around them. It doesn’t matter if they are in the office or at home.
