There are two great lessons. One is the depth of misogyny – some conscious but a great deal unconscious – that exists in too many workplaces. Green would resist the idea that he is endemically sexist; assertive aggression, he would say, is his style to men and women alike. The womenswear buyer and the male director who he humiliated got the same treatment. But the evidence of sexism is too overwhelming. The male director Shah quotes him bullying was not called fat.
“…what we do know is that Green hardly considered creating great places to work as fundamental to leading a business.”
It doesn’t seem as if charities are any better, but I don’t see Willy weeping over that.
Peter Brookes’ cartoon in yesterday’s Times was a disgrace. Barely one step from Stuart Freeborn’s Fagin.
Green’s hardly in a position to be calling others fat, is he?
As an insult, it’s only hurtful to women. Grown men don’t care about being called fat. (“Fatty” works on boys though.)
The rotten culture?
I don’t mind if people look at the various stories/rumours about Philip Green, John Lasseter, Linus Torvalds, Harvey Weinstein and Andy Rubin and say that it’s not nice behaviour, but you can’t deny they were hugely successful. They delivered some pretty great products to people (half the high street, Pixar, Linux, Pulp Fiction, Android), defeated rivals.
And in the end, that’s what matters. If the “culture” produces that, that’s what we want.
I’m sure The Guardian has endless meetings about diversity and workplace culture, and it’s lovely and polite, but they’re going to be out of business in a decade at current rate.
I see he managed to squeeze Brexit in there. Because, of course, the shining knights of the EU are all that stands between us and the Philip Greens of this world.
JuliaM,
Almost no-one is “bullied” at work. This has become one of those misused terms, like people talking about being traumatised by Trump being president. Did you turn up every day to work after The Donald was elected, do your work well, go home, have a reasonable family life? Right, you were upset by The Donald becoming president and you have no fucking idea what trauma is.
If you turned up at work and someone demanded your lunch money and got violent if you didn’t hand it over, that would be workplace bullying. Even then, it just ain’t the same thing as school bullying. You can find another job and leave.
Agreed, BoM4. I think we lost it when we started to talk about ‘bullying’ on social media, which is closer to writing “X is a poof/fat slag” on the bog wall than it is to the old-style of demanding lunch money with menaces. I understand the latter still goes on in schools (unsurprisingly, populated as they are by young humans), but has been upgraded to mobile phones.
People on large salaries who weren’t doing their jobs got shouted at. It’s all people round here are talking about in the pubs and shops.
Perhaps if someone had shouted at Hutton more often he wouldn’t have ruined the Industrial Society and fucked up their pension?
Unconscious = I know you’re a shit but you can’t defend yourself because you don’t know why.
JuliaM + 1
I was once a regional manager for a (real) charity set up by compassionate but conservative folk. I was relentlessly ‘bullied’ by a feminist assistant director for my “right-wing” views. I kept a dossier including her 153 threatening emails. I presented the dossier to HR, whose first reaction was to suggest I might leave with compensation of sorts. I stood my ground and threatened to go public. Stalemate. Nine weeks later the feminazi left for a high-ranking post in a (fake) charity.
I think the lefterati are confusing NDAs (presumably to avoid the time expense and publicity of defending a tribunal case)with an admission of guilt
This could prove expensive for the telegraph who seems to have put the orange one up to this stunt
I do hope so
The irony is if you asked women who the real bullies are, most of them would say female bosses.
Will Hutton is a reliable bellweather. If you went through life disbelieving everything he says as total ignorant bollocks you won’t go far wrong.
Didn’t Philip Green and his firm endorse the Remain side in the EU referendum?
Green seems to be a pleuk on the arse of humanity. But has he actually been accused of a crime?
Rob,
“Will Hutton is a reliable bellweather. If you went through life disbelieving everything he says as total ignorant bollocks you won’t go far wrong.”
Is there a term for the opposite of a bellweather? Bellend, maybe?
‘One is the depth of misogyny – some conscious but a great deal unconscious – that exists in too many workplaces.’
A MAN whining about misogyny. Instant qualification as a shi+head.
The problem Hutton fights is FREEDOM. If I want to be a misogynist, I will. The root of socialism is a hatred of freedom. You have a human right to be a misogynist.
@Bloke on M4, October 28, 2018 at 8:44 am
Melanie Philips worked for The Grudge in early career, her opinion – rude, intolerant bunch of back-stabbing hypocrites.
Labour uses NDAs to gag staff over sex claims
Once again proving the Left have no standards.
Will Hutton presumably claims not to remember the early 50s when *Sir* Bernard and *Lady* Docker were notorious for the extravagant lifestyles. But a simple glance at history will show how wrong he is to blame them (and when was Lady Docker an executive at BSA) for presiding over the decline of our champion mo’bike as Norton was winning the championships until – under Docker – BSA developed racing bikes to compete with Norton and in Docker’s last year BSA had 53 bikes in the Manx TT to Norton’s one and the rest had only one.BSA’s decline came a decade or more after Docker was pushed out of BSA. Docker presided over the *rise* of BSA Motorcycles.
And yet if he was a football manager or celebrity chef his tough no nonsense style would be apllauded
The current sudden determination that NDAs are the work of the devil and must be cast into outer darkness is ironic, because I suspect that the biggest user of them is not evil capitalists like Philip Green but the public sector, to silence whistle blowers, particularly in the NHS.
If NDAs are going to be decreed verboten then there’s going to be a lot of public sector managers looking a bit worried – how are they going to keep all the skeletons in their closets secret if they can’t gag people blowing the whistle on whats really going on?