Welcome to my Blog – I hope you will visit here from time to time. I am a former Chairman & CEO ready to give advice on matters both business like and politics. I will write articles and sound off about things that appear in the media that make no sense – and even write some business case studies – if you like an article, feel free to contact me – my hope is that we will learn from each other. I have strong views and, hopefully, an open mind. With time on my hands (at last) and decades of success and centuries of failures to look back on, just maybe you will learn with me.

Alex

The latest problems surrounding the failed major banks are giving politicians even more slack to pile “popular” solutions onto straight forward problems. Let’s be clear, a business that loses billions has performed poorly. Sympathy it does not need – solutions only please!

It matters not a jot whether the failure is due to a couple of dozen executives who got things wrong, or anything else – there must be no reward that year – even for the cashier who may have got it right. The bottom line is that whenever a business loses money, there must be no reward for anyone in the organisation. In the case of the major Banks – taxpayers should come before employees – once the banks are free of taxpayers money and profitable, then bonus’s can be paid as a reward for achieving meaningful goals.

Dave Cameron’s proposal that there should be a cap of 2,000 pounds on bonus’s and only for those in the lower ranks is a straight electoral bribe to the masses – nothing less. In a situation where a business has lost so much of its wealth, there must be nobody who is rewarded – full stop. Indeed failure should attract sacrifice not reward. The business which lost billions needs to reduce its costs and re-build its strategy – whilst this goes on jobs will be lost, salaries will be reduced and bonus’s not paid – to anyone. Otherwise we will create capitalism on a sea of jelly, where the basic principles of profit and loss become irrelevant, and where politicians with vested interests decide what is and isn’t fair.

The greed and stupidity in the boardroom will not be cured by subsidised bonus payments! People within a business are the only ones that can effect a cure and the cure often adds up to sacrifice and some pain. To try to avoid the inevitable is more cruel than the cure.

Everyone will suffer when an enterprise goes from good to bad – it is every employee’s fault when companies fail – or nobody’s – you choose!

Bonus is a reward for helping to create a healthy and profitable business

Bonus to employees in a business that has lost billions is a subsidised bribe.