WHAT GOD COMPLEX? BLANKFEIN IS JUST FEELING A WEE BIT LONELY
One could feel a bit sorry for Goldman Sach’s chairman and chief executive Lloyd Blankfein. Push aside the fact that he earns more than the GDP of a small country for doing “God’s work”, and life on the 30th floor starts to look very lonely.
“People are pissed off, mad and bent out of shape. I know I could slit my wrists and people would cheer,” the poor old banker rued in an interview with a Sunday newspaper.
Cue his most ingenious plan yet. With all the omnipresence of God himself, Blankfein has found a way to ensure he is always in the hearts of his people.
According to the Sunday Times, Goldman employees are forced to check their secure voicemail throughout the day to receive the latest pearls of wisdom from their leader and his head of operations, Eileen Dillon. These gems can consist of Goldman performance figures, anecdotes of encouragement or instructions to “switch off on holiday, for goodness sake”.
Perhaps it’s time Lloyd looked into getting a hobby? Feeding the five thousand or turning water into wine could come in handy at the more frugal Christmas parties this year…
YOUNG BLOOD
It’s heartening to see that, despite having 230 years of experience under its belt, the Bank of England is still happy to take on fresh blood.
This Wednesday the Bank will welcome 17-year old Usman Ali onto the team for a day. Ali, the member of the Youth Parliament for Calderdale, is taking part in a project led by the Children’s Commissioner, where young people meet with decision-makers to learn about their roles. Among other senior figures, he will be meeting with BoE chief economist Spencer Dale to chat monetary policy.
He bashfully informed The Capitalist, that he got the day organised by initially emailing governor Mervyn King directly. Merv did not get in touch, but his office did. Something tells me we’ll be hearing more from Usman Ali… watch this space.
CHAIN REACTION
Hot on the heels of Bank of New York Mellon chairman and chief executive Bob Kelly’s firm denial of any interest in the role of CEO at Bank of America,
Hereisthecity.com have kindly drafted an unusually useful chain letter for City executives. It comes with the warning that “ignoring this email could ruin your career”.
It reads: “Please send this e-mail on to 10 friends, urging them to send it on to 10 others. This is most important. Failure to do so could result in you (or your friends) being shortlisted for a very unpopular job!
“I am not and was never interested in becoming the next CEO of Bank of America. I would rather have any other job (or no job) than that job”.
Take note ITV chairman and chief executive “hopefuls”.