 Martin Sorrell |
The biggest takeaway from the Martin Sorrell mess at WPP is that a corporate board must be held accountable for the actions of a CEO, even if that person launched the company and served as its driving force.
The Financial Times reported June 11 that Sorrell maintained a reign of terror management style, verbally abusing executive assistants and junior colleagues.
One staffer called her salary “combat pay,” while another labeled it as “battle pay.” The doctor of another WPP staffer told her that she would be dead within a year if she continued working for Sorrell.
WPP’s “extracted” CEO Sorrell denies mistreating or verbally abusing anybody at the firm, though he admits that he can be difficult at times.
The WPP board also is responsible for the lavish compensation packages showered on Sorrell through the years and an employment contract that unbelievably lacked a “non-compete clause,” which allowed him to launch S4 Capital as a venture designed to mimic his masterpiece of WPP.
How could this happen? Obviously, the board was asleep at the switch.
Though Sorrell was synonymous with WPP, the board has a fiduciary duty to represent the interest of all shareholders and staff of WPP.
WPP chairman Roberta Quarta gets a little slack because he only took the post in 2015.
Quarta told shareholders at the June 13 general meeting that directors take their jobs very seriously and are concerned about issues raised by the FT.
Actions, though, speak louder than words. The investment and marketing communications community will be closely monitoring WPP’s board. Can it redeem itself?
WPP Co-COO Mark Read made a strong bid to assume Sorrell’s CEO post via a memo sent to staffers just ahead of the general meeting that stressed the ad/PR firm’s commitment to fostering working environments where staffers "feel safe and supported."
He wrote: "I feel we should remind ourselves of and reinforce the kind of values we want and need to have within every part of our business: values of fairness, tolerance, kindness and—again—respect.”
Read, and fellow Co-COO Andrew Scott are leading a review of WPP’s policies and code of conduct.
Good luck to both of them.
The North American 'united bid' for the World Cup doesn't look so united these days... State Dept muzzles political speech as it investigates deporting an influential opponent of Iranian war... Wall Street Journal 'discovers' corporate communications.
Momentum is building for nuclear power but public support is not guaranteed, according to a survey conducted by Ruder Finn... America First PR founder admits to assaulting a woman in a London tube station... If they knew their presence would disrupt the lives of thousands of people, neither Barack Obama nor George W. Bush would have attended the NBA Finals. They were not narcissists-in-chief. 
Ukraine struck PR gold as its launches drone attack on St. Petersburg oil depot ahead of 'Putin's Davos' designed to put a positive spin on Russia's economy that is reeling under the 'special military operation' that has cost the lives of more than 500K soldiers... Defense Secretary Hegseth ups war against reporters... Extremist government ministers marching in NYC Israel Day Parade further hurts the country's image. 
Cuba will make or break Secretary of State Marco Rubio's bid for the 2028 Republican presidential nomination... Ballard Partners and BGR Group push for justice for the family of Robert Levinson, who was abducted and vanished in Iran 19 years ago... Robert Daley, the pistol-packing larger-than-life PR guy who was PA chief for the NYPD, dies at 96.
Pope Leo's encyclical on dangers of AI has JD Vance rethinking his justification for Trump's war with Iran... Software tools remove guardrails on Google, Meta AI models that aim to protect against biological war, child sex abuse, stealing credit card info, reports the Financial Times... US tech sector drops nearly 100K jobs during first four months of the year.
