This is an internal e-mail that Mike Zafirovski issued about the Hackney “incident”.
“All of us at Nortel have an obligation to act with personal and professional integrity. These behaviors are the hallmarks of great leaders and great companies. I place as high a value on integrity and ethics as I do our goals of driving superior performance and business results.
As many of you know, there has been great concern recently because of an incident involving one of our co-workers and a leader, Joel Hackney. Given the nature of this incident I want to personally restate our commitment to ethics and integrity and share the action we have taken.
Last October, following a basketball game that he attended with his wife and children, Joel was involved in an incident that resulted in him entering into a consent agreement, which means he is required to complete certain actions by May 2007 before the charges will be completely dismissed.
Nortel takes this incident very seriously and, for the last six days, Chief Compliance Officer Bob Bartzokas has led a rigorous review involving numerous external and internal interviews (the internal interviews were with employees in and outside of Joel’s organization). This process was comprehensive in nature and I want to assure you that we took full account of all the employee input and response we’ve received regarding the incident.
Bob and the Compliance Committee completed their review and concluded the October incident was isolated. The Committee recommended certain appropriate actions and advised the board of directors of its findings and recommendations. The specific details of the actions will remain private, as they would for any Nortel employee.
Joel deeply regrets this incident and the impact it is having on everyone concerned. Knowing my intent to update you today, he asked me to share the following statement:
“I want you to know that I am taking full responsibility for the consequences of my actions. I have also communicated my personal apology to Ms. Ogden. I know this incident has caused embarrassment for my family, my employer and my co-workers. I am truly sorry.â€
Joel is a leader with an important mandate who will need to continue to challenge his team to perform at world-class levels while exemplifying our leadership and core values. His track record includes very strong results and his leadership capability has been validated by employee assessments (as recent as December 2006), which included feedback from all of his direct reports. That said, I know Joel is taking this incident very seriously and will use it to work to become an even better leader.
I am absolutely confident of Joel’s ability to execute our business objectives, and he has given me his full assurance that he will hold to the highest ethical and professional standards expected of a Nortel leader.
To ANON. First of all, change your moniker to MORON and realize that it’s an “Ethics Policy”, not an “ethical policy”, second of all, IT and email disclosure are governed by IT policies, not ethics policies. And EVERY Nortel employee agrees to those every time they sign on to their network.
I’m finished wasting time trying to talk sense into the same crowd that perpetually slimes Nortel every silly chance they get. Go back to the Yahoo NT board and rake muck there….
Female employee
Hackney and his buddy Z got what they wanted – more or less the rumors stopped. But they can be sure we are not going to forget about this incident. One day they will have to pay for this, but the judge will be from a completely other instance.
Actually they overstepped the border and everyone who just thinks about blaming them for that will learn that he/her should better quit. So what they are laying us off anyway! I would plead that we should not stop to epress ourselves…
Anon
Ahhh…the typical ad hominem from someone unable to cogently argue their point of view. Makes me laugh to be called a moron under these circumstances. Are you the typical employee? Maybe you like to grab girls faces too….
Lets see. I state “ethics policy” 4 times in my post and you pick out the one time where I mistype. Ah yes, only morons have typos. hahaha.
And uh, you ever think that people don’t agree to jack squat when they login? And if they did, again, refer back to my question about whether or not you forward jokes or anything information you see in email to others outside the company. Only the rare employee sends no company info (of any level of disclosure) outside the company–you must be involved in operations or supply chain or something. I think you don’t want to answer that because it incriminates you and destroys your argument. When an email deserves confidentiality, it is labeled so. I do. What about you?
A tired employee
As a current employee, I took the training on Nortel’s ethics policy. The examples used in the online video training to describe unethical behaviour included the sharing of jokes that some (not all) employees would find offensive; derogatory comments made from one employee to another, etc…
The issue in this case is that the behaviour was made off Nortel property and was not work related. However, the zero tolerance attitude that Mike Z has promoted from the beginning of his term has been seriously questioned. Additionally, Mike’s ongoing promotion of the quality of his leadership team (as professionals and as individuals) is also in doubt.
We could continue to debate the federal and state legal system in the US, but I’m not sure why. The question here comes down to Mike Z himself, as a leader and as an individual. He has promoted, in the past, his commitment to community. By keeping Hackney on staff he has sent a clear message to employees, customers and stakeholders: when it comes down to it, he is unable to exercise the power and authority that he has been handed to do the right thing (live up to his own ethical beliefs) and has been convinced (forced?) by others that keeping Hackney is somehow good for business.
Ultimately this decision will come back to haunt Mike Z and all of us at Nortel. We may not recognize the root cause when it comes back at us, but no doubt we will feel the impact in the months to come.
BS
funny that the same guy who talks about ad hominem abuse then implies I “grab girls’ faces”. I rest my case. Witchhunting is fun when you’re the disgruntled laid off employee, isn’t it?
Zafirovski’s E-mail About Hackney
This is an internal e-mail that Mike Zafirovski issued about the Hackney “incident”.
“All of us at Nortel have an obligation to act with personal and professional integrity. These behaviors are the hallmarks of great leaders and great companies. I place as high a value on integrity and ethics as I do our goals of driving superior performance and business results.
As many of you know, there has been great concern recently because of an incident involving one of our co-workers and a leader, Joel Hackney. Given the nature of this incident I want to personally restate our commitment to ethics and integrity and share the action we have taken.
Last October, following a basketball game that he attended with his wife and children, Joel was involved in an incident that resulted in him entering into a consent agreement, which means he is required to complete certain actions by May 2007 before the charges will be completely dismissed.
Nortel takes this incident very seriously and, for the last six days, Chief Compliance Officer Bob Bartzokas has led a rigorous review involving numerous external and internal interviews (the internal interviews were with employees in and outside of Joel’s organization). This process was comprehensive in nature and I want to assure you that we took full account of all the employee input and response we’ve received regarding the incident.
Bob and the Compliance Committee completed their review and concluded the October incident was isolated. The Committee recommended certain appropriate actions and advised the board of directors of its findings and recommendations. The specific details of the actions will remain private, as they would for any Nortel employee.
Joel deeply regrets this incident and the impact it is having on everyone concerned. Knowing my intent to update you today, he asked me to share the following statement:
“I want you to know that I am taking full responsibility for the consequences of my actions. I have also communicated my personal apology to Ms. Ogden. I know this incident has caused embarrassment for my family, my employer and my co-workers. I am truly sorry.â€
Joel is a leader with an important mandate who will need to continue to challenge his team to perform at world-class levels while exemplifying our leadership and core values. His track record includes very strong results and his leadership capability has been validated by employee assessments (as recent as December 2006), which included feedback from all of his direct reports. That said, I know Joel is taking this incident very seriously and will use it to work to become an even better leader.
I am absolutely confident of Joel’s ability to execute our business objectives, and he has given me his full assurance that he will hold to the highest ethical and professional standards expected of a Nortel leader.
Mike Z