Email Embarrassment Hits Execs As Well

from the think-before-you-send... dept

Tue, May 9th 2006 5:00pm — Mike Masnick

There have been plenty of stories over the past few years concerning people who wrote embarrassing emails related to their job, that eventually got passed around, causing some people to lose their jobs. Of course, in most of the well known cases, it's been a junior employee. The latest story, though, concerns a senior exec. The President of EMC China apparently got upset after finding himself locked out of the office without his keys, and sent an angry email to his secretary, blaming her for leaving the office while assuming that he would actually have a copy of the office key himself. He appears to have copied the email to a bunch of other senior execs. The secretary responded that he seemed to unfairly be blaming her for his own forgetfulness concerning his keys. Of course, she also cc'd her response to all EMC employees in China -- which may have been a bit much. Once that happened, the message began to spread like wildfire, as people forwarded it around. The story kept growing, and now, the exec in question is apparently about to resign, in large part due to the incident and all the publicity it has received in China. It's yet another reminder that you shouldn't assume email messages are just between you and whoever you sent it to.

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14 Comments

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f15h, 9 May 2006 @ 5:47pm

wow...
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Andrew Pollack, 9 May 2006 @ 5:53pm

The guy should quit or be fired.
Nothing is a surer sign of someone that should be fired than when that someone plays the childish amature hour game of copying a bunch of unrelated people (or managers) when chewing someone out or demanding something as a play for more pressure.

Its amature hour politics, only works short term, and is a sure sign of someone in over their head without the confidence to handle a challenge without feeling threatened.

Loosers.
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Anonymous Coward, 9 May 2006 @ 5:55pm

This is the new TechDirt???
Who the hell cares about this lame ass story.. I dont know why I read it... President of EMC china??? Who cares.. Please... Real Tech NEWS!!!!
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Scott, 9 May 2006 @ 6:46pm

Re: This is the new TechDirt???
I found it to be an interesting story.
So, I care.

If you don't like it, skip to the next story.
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yep, 9 May 2006 @ 6:49pm

Re: This is the new TechDirt???
uh..you obviosly don't really think that much, do you? For those of you with tv sized attention spans: the moral of the story is don't send nasty emails to co-workers, cuz you'll look like an ass. (wait, too late) Seems pretty tech related to me.
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Carmela, 9 May 2006 @ 7:14pm

Mike hope you find a real job soon, this stuff is wasting your time.
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Anonymous Coward, 9 May 2006 @ 8:38pm

like that dumbass at computercops name paul laudan
that got pissed off when someone posted on the board what he wrote to them in "private"

he then claimed it was priviledged communication and banned the person from his site.
what an asshole!

then when he found the person posting at another site he went and registered there under his real name and began to badger the poster at www.theeldergeek.com until admin there told him to get off that site.

there are dirtballs all over the net!
http://castlecops.com/modules.php?name=Forums&file=groupcp&g=4
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Anonymous Coward, 9 May 2006 @ 8:40pm

i remember that!
LOL!

how are you these days,TMOV?

IKE
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Mathew Schlabaugh, 9 May 2006 @ 8:41pm

The man in this story obviously takes no accountability for his actions. He doesn't really sound like someone who should lead a company. Someone told me once... A man shows how big he is by the respect he can show to little ones. He sounds like a bully. But, why was he so threatened by his administrative assistant?

I personally find this site entertaining. Besides who is to say what is and isn't news. We all read it didn't we? :-) Besides how can anyone trust the words of an "Anonymous Coward"?
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Anonymous Coward, 9 May 2006 @ 9:03pm

many,many people will post spontaneously when they read a news item.
to register at every site on the net is impossible to do.

they probably have no annonimity because their I.P. numbers are logged.
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thecaptain, 10 May 2006 @ 5:14am

Re:
The man in this story obviously takes no accountability for his actions. He doesn't really sound like someone who should lead a company.

Sadly from personal experience, he's the rule rather than the exception.

I was amused by this, I definitely enjoyed the fact that his assistant had the brass ones to stand up to him and reply in the manner she did. Good for her.

As for the "Anonymous Coward" above. Don't feed the troll. Techdirt is enjoying a higher and higher profile I think...and with that higher profile comes more people posting...and with that INEVITABLY comes the losers who have very little intelligence who find it entertaining to scream and whine and cajole and TRY to outrage. They gutlessly revel in their anonymity and figure there are no consequences to their actions.
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Joe Dirt, 11 May 2006 @ 11:57am

I'm with you #3. Who gives a rats ass??
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Anonymous Coward, 24 May 2006 @ 5:47am

HAHAHAHAHAH, I love it when exec's show their true colors - and everyone else sees it too!!
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