business

McDonald's CEO ousted after consensual relationship with employee

40 Comments
By CATHY BUSSEWITZ and DEE-ANN DURBIN

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It should never be up to a company to dictate what employees do in their free time, unless it is illegal or obviously brings the company into disrepute. 

At the executive level, companies pay the exec to give up the freedom to sleep with employees, as such relationships can create leverage against the executive. It’s in the best interests of the company, the executive enters into the agreement willingly, and are compensated for the position they are in.

And look at this guy’s comments. He clearly understands it was his own mistake that put him in this situation.

4 ( +5 / -1 )

Except that guys are being punished now for consensual relationships....

too true. I think Bill Gates deserves retroactive punishment. He'd never be allowed to marry his "life partner" and former company subordinate Melinda Gates under today's new Puritanism regulations and still keep his job.

3 ( +5 / -2 )

Never dip your pen in the company's ink well.

There are many good reasons for these rules.

Perhaps it is an American work-culture thing because everyone above you has control over your raises, advancement, and can ensure you get put on bad projects.

8 of 10 companies where I've worked had policies against romantic relationships with coworkers.

Adults don't always behave like adults when relationships fail.

2 ( +3 / -1 )

Easterbrook went out fairly meekly, no?

No company should be able to restrict the rights of its workers to form relationships.

I would propose that the US constitution might be a remedy to protect freedom of association.

However,McDonalds would counter Easterbrook signed that away as he penned the McDonald’s contract.

What would a court say?

1 ( +1 / -0 )

No it’s likely the company has this policy due to #metoo. Because things like this used to be fine, especially when executives do it.

A very quick bit of internet research shows that this is nonsense. I found in seconds that this policy existed for at least a decade prior to #metoo.

1 ( +1 / -0 )

One should never fish off the company pier, or better said, never get your honey, where you get your money!!!

1 ( +1 / -0 )

violating company policy by engaging in a consensual relationship with an employee

Insane.

It should never be up to a company to dictate what employees do in their free time, unless it is illegal or obviously brings the company into disrepute. This does not.

0 ( +7 / -7 )

Guys everywhere are reassessing their game, most have totally forsworn workplace relationships altogether, some have a let the women make the first move policy.

I know "guys", and I can honestly say without doubt that not a single one is doing this to my knowledge.

Perhaps your social and work circle is quite different, but I very much doubt it. Massively exaggerating things you've read elsewhere is more your game.

0 ( +1 / -1 )

I am wondering if the relationship with the subordinate has anything to do with that an article from a year ago described him as a family man living with his wife and three children but Wiki now describes him as divorced with three children.

Now that's pretty sad

0 ( +0 / -0 )

When did the MeToo movement stop being a way to give victims of sexual harassment and attack the courage to speak out publicly about the assault on their person, and to highlight how common sexual assault is?

It is being discussed here by some as though it is an invention by women in order to inconvenience those men who only seem able to talk to women by remarking on their physical appearance.

Sexual harassment and assault needs to stop. Clearly some posters here think there is no need to find ways to prevent it. For shame.

0 ( +2 / -2 )

Details of Easterbrook's separation package will be released Monday

Do we really need to hear about that?

0 ( +0 / -0 )

Slave wages and such...and he is removed for this? Well, now we know how to get rid of the rest of the board, right, Fight For 15?

0 ( +0 / -0 )

wonder why this article doesn't mention this: "McDonald's pays ousted chief $675,000 in severance deal" which is according to the Guardian.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

.....makes for interesting reading actually.... all kinds of stuff not mentioned above: https://www.theguardian.com/business/2019/nov/04/mcdonalds-pays-ousted-chief-675000-in-severance-deal

0 ( +0 / -0 )

Didn't see anything about THIS relationship that was bad except that it violated McDs policy.

There's a huge world out there full of women/men to date. The number inside any company is tiny. It was never an issue when I was single to find dates outside work. But I only worked like a dog with the Japanese for a year. That year I can't remember having any long term relationships. Many of my coworkers had over 2 hr commutes, each way. Blowing 4 hrs daily for commuting?

In America, few people work the hours that Japanese salarymen work. Since 1999, I've generally worked just 42-45 hrs a week (or much less since 2007), which leaves plenty of time for family/dating/relationships/hobbies. Plus, my commute to work was 30 minutes or less.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

8 of 10 companies where I've worked had policies against romantic relationships with coworkers.

Just wrong. The companies are just more scared of some lawsuit and so abuse their power over employees' private lives.

-1 ( +1 / -2 )

Employees shouldn’t have to work at companies where the bosses get to sleep with employees.

a guy making 16 million dollars a year and who is CEO should he able to meet someone he doesn’t work with and not have to misuse power.

-1 ( +4 / -5 )

Welcome to the new reality where workplace romance is a treacherous minefield.

What is it, specifically, that men and women have to do differently nowadays, in order not to be accused of sexual harassment at work?

Vague explanations like "we can't have a laugh any more" obviously don't suffice.

-1 ( +2 / -3 )

Yep this CEO guy thought he was smooth too. just using his social intelligence to decide she liked him just for him, nothing to do about his title or money.

How do you know what he thought? Did he do an interview you’ve read?

Yet someone thought it was inappropriate

Yeah, the company to whom he’d agreed that he wouldn’t participate in such relationships. And they fired him.

now his 16 million dollar a year job is gone, and he won’t get getting another one thanks to #metoo

No, thanks to corporate policy that has been around way longer than metoo.

I feel for the guys whom are getting hysterical about metoo. They see boogey(wo)men in every shadow. Talk about stress!

-1 ( +2 / -3 )

Most men have caught on to the new rules and are biting their lip whenever a women enters the room. It'll take a few years for women to notice that men have started to back off at work.

Women: Men are all pigs! They just want to sleep with us! #metoo

Men: OK, let's ignore our female co-workers then.

Women: Why doesn't anyone notice me anymore!

-1 ( +2 / -3 )

No it’s likely the company has this policy due to #metoo.

Yeah, McDonalds didn’t have a company policy on sleeping with subordinates until #metoo. Facepalm.

Its amazing how often people will say things here that clearly expose their ignorance on how the world works, yet the the tone of their post is that they know what they are talking about.

-1 ( +2 / -3 )

Casualties of metoo, just like all the others.

What? There were lonely women wondering why they couldn't find men before metoo.

You guys are seeing #metoo in every shadow it seems. It must be stressful for you.

-1 ( +1 / -2 )

A very quick bit of internet research shows that this is nonsense. I found in seconds that this policy existed for at least a decade prior to #metoo.

You're more patient than I. I thought the claim that McDs didn't have a police on this until the #metoo movement was such a ridiculously stupid statement, that it didn't even warrant fact checking. I would have bet money on its existence, and I would have won.

These anti-#metooers really are panicking.

-1 ( +1 / -2 )

Except that guys are being punished now for consensual relationships.

This guy is getting pushed for contractual problems. Has nothing to do with #metoo.

I really do feel for the inept guys who don’t know how to properly interact with women who, who now are freaked out about metoo. It must suck to know you’re probably lacking the social intelligence to be able to ever have sex with a willing woman now that they have to worry about being called out if they do it to her unwillingly.

If I knew I was never going to be able to have sex again I’d be pretty angry too.

-2 ( +1 / -3 )

No it’s likely the company has this policy due to #metoo. Because things like this used to be fine, especially when executives do it.

No, thanks to corporate policy that has been around way longer than metoo. 

I feel for the guys whom are getting hysterical about metoo. They see boogey(wo)men in every shadow. Talk about stress!

-2 ( +0 / -2 )

You seem to think it's amusing that some men are resigned to a life of loneliness because they fear to tread into the metoo minefield

No, I think it’s sad. Poor guys, that would be a torturous life. It’s not amusing, it’s pitiable.

remember that mathematically, for every lonely guy that you laugh at there's a corresponding lonely women wondering why she can't find a partner.

I don’t know if your math is particularly accurate, but anyone with a heart feels bad for those women too.

-2 ( +1 / -3 )

Geez, society doesn't seem better off in this metoo minefield does it.

Well, the guys worried about getting called out for doing things they shouldn't definitely don't think so.

Women who have more of a voice in not getting abused and having to deal with creepy dudes all the time would think society has got better.

And for those who weren't creeps before #metoo started, nothing really changed for better or worse, other than that the women around us have an easier life now, which is good.

-2 ( +1 / -3 )

Yep this CEO guy thought he was smooth too. just using his social intelligence to decide she liked him just for him, nothing to do about his title or money.

Yet someone thought it was inappropriate (maybe her when she didn’t get something she wanted, maybe a jealous coworker).

now his 16 million dollar a year job is gone, and he won’t get getting another one thanks to #metoo

-3 ( +1 / -4 )

Probably he even wore and signed those company directives. Likely thought they didn’t apply to him.

how do I know what he thought? Cause his actions show me what he thought by what he did.

-3 ( +0 / -3 )

Men on the other hand have to be extremely careful before saying anything that could remotely be misinterpreted by any women within earshot lest he immediately lose his job and all prospects of a future career.

No, that’s not true. Maybe in some edge case extends but that’s not the norm.

Companies have the same polices as they did. If you say racist, sexist or bigoted or sexually harassing things, companies will let you go. It’s always been like that.

-4 ( +0 / -4 )

Romantic relationships with coworkers, even when their totally consensual, are suicide in the post metoo era.

No they’re not. That’s an entirely illogical and silly conclusion. There are millions and millions of coworkers in relationships, just as there always has been and will be.

Its a truth however that those dudes who know they are creepy and don’t know how to properly interact with women have been panicked in the post me too era, as they are rightfully worried that they’re going to be forced to take responsibility for their actions in the future. Guys who know how to deal with girls will be act as properly as they always have, and will have no problems beyond the Norma relationship ones they’ve always had.

See, for the creeps, the dating world got flipped upside down. For normal guys nothing changed, the world still works the way it always did.

-10 ( +4 / -14 )

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