Telstra’s first blogging casualty
UPDATE: This story has made the front page of News.com.au.
Tom Reynolds rang me this morning to tell me he was available to work on some TPN projects over the next couple of weeks as he’d been sacked from Telstra this morning. Co-incidentally, Tom wrote this blog post only two days ago quoting Robert Scoble’s Corporate Weblog Manifesto and saying from now on he was going to be more open and honest in his blogging. Tom wrote:
… sometimes departments here have allowed a culture of “duck and cover†to rule them. Personally I think the new idea of “One Click, One Touch, One Telstra†is fine- in theory, but there will need to be more than just a fancy jingo and a series of cool new ads. We need to look at what we rate as important and make it happen.
I consider this a huge mistake on behalf of Telstra. I just gave a quote to News.com.au telling them the same thing. About two weeks ago I sat next to Paul Crisp, Corporate Affairs Manager at Telstra, at the Australian Institute of Marketing breakfast and told the audience that companies which allow blogging have to have two policies - one for the bloggers, so they know what they can write about without getting into trouble, and the second for the managers in the company so they know how to treat bloggers if they have concerns about how or what they blog.
It seems to me that Tom is a victim of a manager inside of Telstra who isn’t on the program and has concerns about a member of the team writing openly and honestly about working inside the company. A similar thing happened to me at Microsoft. I jumped ship and started TPN. Just think… Microsoft could have kept this creativity and energy inside the company. Telstra could have kept Tom inside the company but instead they will make him a celebrity. I told Tom this morning to get ready to leverage being "the guy that Telstra sacked for blogging".
Here’s a link to Tom’s personal blog. I know he’s taking it easy today so don’t expect to hear much from him until he clears his head.
October 6th, 2006 at 11:05 pm
Amazing what happens as soon as NWAT gets interesting… this could finally get them of the ground no
October 7th, 2006 at 10:14 am
[...] Telstra corporate blogger gets the arse Published October 7th, 2006 in Online Strategy Tags: online publishing, online strategy. Cameron Reilly got the scoop on Telstra corporate blogger Tom Reynolds getting the arse following his effort to help Telstra become more transparent. Tom’s sinful words: … sometimes departments here have allowed a culture of “duck and cover†to rule them. Personally I think the new idea of “One Click, One Touch, One Telstra†is fine- in theory, but there will need to be more than just a fancy jingo and a series of cool new ads. We need to look at what we rate as important and make it happen. When big organisations want to look like they ‘get it’ the shareholders’ opinion often gets in the way. This looks like a case of “Shit, what will our shareholders think? Let’s get rid of that blogger, we don’t want him causing trouble.” What a shame for Telstra - the company has lot talent. Big companies can’t approach online strategy from the same angle as small companies. When you’re small, being transparent and honest is one of the best moves you can make. Throw shareholders and a monolothic management structure into the mix and not everyone will think it’s the best idea. If it’s such a concern, why not get smarter about publishing? What about only giving the ‘Publish’ button to the PR department, so they can proof everyone else’s drafts? Publishing filtered content is better than not publishing at all - without the above paragraph Tom’s post was still stellar for Telstra’s corporate image. [...]
October 9th, 2006 at 11:03 am
For the record, Tom’s departure from Telstra had nothing to do with his blog on Nowwearetalking. Any suggestion that he was victimised for his blogging is a complete and utter fabrication. Tom’s blogs were well received and the NWAT team is sorry to lose one of our regular contributors.
October 9th, 2006 at 11:47 am
Paul - then there must be some problem with the communication between Tom’s former manager at Telstra and the employment agency who did her bidding because, accoring to my information, blogging was DEFINITELY mentioned when he was instructed by them not go back to Telstra. If he was so valued, I’m surprised he wasn’t given the bad news directly. And also surprised that you haven’t found some other use for his skills.
October 9th, 2006 at 2:02 pm
[...] Tom Reynolds, the guy who was a Telstra blogger until his contract was unceremoniously terminated last week, oh-so-coincidentally 24 hours after he wrote a post slightly critical of Telstra, joins Rich and I on the show today. [...]
October 9th, 2006 at 5:14 pm
Hmm keep in mind that Telstra is currently sacking some 12,000 people (as far as I remember) over the next few years — a lot of the culling has already taken place. Could be this is just part of that.
Cheers,
Renai
October 9th, 2006 at 5:21 pm
Renai, true, but Tom wasn’t part of a systematic bloodletting. As I mentioned above, he was told by the employment agency that he was working through that his blogging was one of the reasons he was let go.