The former CEO of BP, Bernard Looney, resigned unexpectedly from his position at the company. There had been some allegations that Mr. Looney had been involved in inappropriate relationships with colleagues. The BP board reviewed the allegations and concluded that there were no violations of the BP code of ethics. Mr. Looney could stay aboard.
However, following that finding, additional allegations emerged. The board then released a statement, “Mr. Looney has today informed the company that he now accepts that he was not fully transparent in his previous disclosures.” Effective immediately, Mr. Looney was gone. Do you just love that Mr. Looney did not say that he in fact had those relationships.? His only admission was that he accepts the board’s definition of transparency about the relationships. The technical term for what Mr. Looney has done following his non-admission admission is weasel.
How many times must we live through these lessons? When it comes to office relationships, two words should do it, “Stop that!” And another piece of advice: Don’t try to hide those relationships, don’t lie about those relationships, don’t resort to analysis of the code of ethics to see if you violated the terms of your contract, and don’t apologize for the lack of transparency. These relationships of CFOs are wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong. Lying about them is crazy No, No– lying about them is actually [L]ooney. Jenny Strasburg, “BP Chief Quits Over His Past Relationships with Staff,” Wall Street Journal, September 13, 2023