Would You Hire This Guy?

There must be a real shortage of quality executives out there because the guy in this picture, Sol Trujillo, an American businessman who recently returned to the States, actually thinks he's going to get hired by another American corporation because he's good at "fixing" broken companies.

For any non-Australian readers, Trujillo's name probably won't ring a bell. But, here in Oz, Trujillo had, until a few weeks ago, been running Telstra, the largest telecommunications company in the land.  It's Telstra that takes at least $300 a month from my pocket in return for a somewhat crappy iPhone service, our meager home telephone service (we pay for every phone call in addition to a $30 monthly fee), and providing internet service at a premium price. This is also the same company that had its Board of Directors meeting in Las Vegas last summer, while the current financial crisis finally started to have an impact here.  And Telstra is the company whose shares have dropped nearly 38 percent during Trujillo's tenure.  If Telstra had any real competition in this country (like the kind that goes on in the U.S., for example), I am certain it would be out of business by now.

Yes, Trujillo was recently forced to leave Telstra after breaking it (maybe this is why he's an expert on fixing broken companies?). During the four years he ran Telstra, however, he earned more than $30 million (US$21 million).  Now he's back in America, and according to an article in today's Australian, he's trying to defend his record at the company: "I don't know if you noticed that there is a global recession going on and we have outperformed the ASX [the Australian stock exchange] in total shareholder return."

Geoff Elliott, who wrote the article, then points out in the next paragraph: 

From the day Mr Trujillo started on July 1, 2005, to the day of his departure last Thursday, Telstra shares have fallen 37.8 per cent compared with a 13 per cent fall by the benchmark S&P/ASX 200 index. Based on total shareholder returns, which takes into account dividend payments, Telstra shares have underperformed the wider market by 18 per cent, according to Bloomberg data.

Since the peak of the stock market in late 2007, the S&P/ASX 200 is off about 44 per cent, while Telstra shares are down just 32 per cent. Still, Telstra shares never moved more than a few cents past the $5.06 mark when Mr Trujillo joined the company and closed yesterday at $3.21.

And this is how someone earns $30 million in four years?  Running a sub-standard company that doesn't even benefit its shareholders, let alone its customers? Fortunately for Trujillo's successor, most Australians don't seem to know how substandard their telecommunication services are compared to the rest of the industrialised world, and therefore expectations are pretty low that it's ever going to get better here.

After digging around a bit, I discovered that before he came to Australia in 2005, Trujillo was the CEO of US West until a hostile takeover by Qwest in 2000. Then he became the CEO of Orange, the French telecom, which has an infamous reputation as an ISP provider in the UK. He's still on the Board of Directors of Orange today.  Gee, I sure hope that someone asks to see Trujillo's resume before he's allowed to "fix" his next company.  

Middle-Aged Man

Yay! We have internet at home! It took several phone calls and a lot of patience, but Telstra finally got our ADSL working this afternoon. I promptly connected our Airport wireless network and Vonage, and both are working fine. That means our U.S. friends can start expecting phone calls very soon, and you can even call us at our old Atlanta number.

Since my last post, we moved into our new home and then headed off to a four-night stay at the Hyatt Regency Coolum at the Sunshine Coast, where I attended a research conference on emotions. This Hyatt is a world-class resort, and it will even be the meeting place for the APEC conference next month (Bush is attending, I think). The beach was fantastic. Kangaroos were jumping around as we walked to breakfast. I saw my first possum. V. had a wonderful one-hour massage. Will spent three hours at Camp Hyatt, and appeared to have lots of fun. Since then, however, our darling boy has not been so happy. He typically wakes up screaming 2-3 times in the middle of the night, and his parents are tired of it. It got so bad at the Hyatt that I had to drive V. and Will home for the final night. It's probably teething problems exacerbated by a cold. We gave him drugs when he went to sleep tonight, so maybe we'll see some improvement.

There's so much more to write about, but finally having home access to the internet means I can resume regular blogging (and read my favorite blogs too), so expect more details very soon. Tonight let me just mention my problems with our rental car. We have had this Mazda sedan for nearly three weeks and it is a great car. I have had no real problems driving on the left side of the road. The problem is with parking. For some reason, Australian parking spaces are narrower than in the U.S., and the rows separating the cars are much, much shorter. This means that parking has become a major headache. I now have several scrapes and a tiny dent in the front and rear bumpers, the result of navigating into spaces next to walls and poles. The rental agency is going to have a major fit when they see it. I need a smaller car! Alas, we plan to buy one later this week. When I went to the Honda dealership today to look at the Jazz (called the Fit in the U.S.), I inquired about whether I would be eligible for any financing (I have no credit history in this country, of course). The salesman used his mobile to call a woman in the business office. He began the call by saying, "I have this middle-aged man who recently moved from the States here..."

I guess I am getting old. But on the inside, I'm still about 24. Really.