Entercom: David Field's Safari email

[SaltyDog]

So what do you think of David Field's email. He was so moved by his recent safari that he sent a long email to his employees telling them about his "soul-stirring experience". Was it in fact motivating or was The Boston Herald's Jessica Heslam right to call it "clueless"?

http://www.bostonherald.com/blogs/n...2/01/13/entercom-radio-chiefs-clueless-email/

 

[TomZ]

A "David" can take him down any day of the week with only some leather and his stones.

Oh, 0bama's still giving away some hefty vacation pay.

 

[NHRadio]

I don't work for Entercom, but if my boss spent more than twice my annual salary on a safari and then exhorted me to work harder by email I'm not sure how I'd feel but "inspired" wouldn't be it. If any CEO would invest a little time and energy making their employees feel they actually matter instead of just expendable numbers on a balance sheet he'd have people that would move mountains for him.

 

[TheBigA]

This is part of that "disconnect" we hear a lot about. This guy lives in one place and his employees live in another.

The way to inspire people is take an example out of THEIR lives and derive a lesson from it. Something THEY can identify with. I doubt any of his employees have ever taken a jungle safari. If he thinks they could learn from it, perhaps he'll invite them to join him some day. That's what Jobs would have done.

 

[SaltyDog]

This is part of that "disconnect" we hear a lot about. This guy lives in one place and his employees live in another.

The way to inspire people is take an example out of THEIR lives and derive a lesson from it. Something THEY can identify with. I doubt any of his employees have ever taken a jungle safari. If he thinks they could learn from it, perhaps he'll invite them to join him some day. That's what Jobs would have done.

The problem I see with this letter, and I think it's essentially the same as you are saying in a different way, is that it's not something his rank and file can relate to. It was written for the wrong audience. If he'd wanted to do something over the holidays and then write a letter to his employees, he should have worked in a soup kitchen helping the homeless or built a house through Habitat for Humanity. I am sure that many of his less-well-off employees have done one or both of those things and could relate to it.

As for Jobs, he was a creative force and an excellent executive, but from reading Walter Isaacson's biography, I gather he had a very cruel side to him. At one point, it is said that he had to fire people and refused to give them severance.