Why do CEO's always say this empty nonsense. If you accept responsibility, you accept consequences - what consequences is Geoff Schmidt going to be facing? Hurt feelings? Give me a break.
The explicit consequences are up to the owners of the company, not the court of public opinion. The owners wouldn't be beyond their rights to demand the CEO's resignation, although neither are they obligated to do that either since everyone makes mistakes. And as others have pointed out there are implicit consequences as well -- less trust from remaining employees, etc.
Unless there is someone else who can do better job, it doesn't make sense for him to step down. However, I do wonder if it would appeasing to take voluntary pay cut as a more visible form of taking responsibility. Just a thought.
I often view these statements with knee jerk cynicism (though I recognize it as such) because too often you read about layoffs while executives get golden parachutes. Why should the CEO get the 30 million payout to leave the failing company while everyone else gets comparative peanuts and loses their job.
I can sympathize a bit with why people feel bitter about these things.
I also know some business owners and people who run start ups, those who do it with integrity do have genuine feelings they have to process around this. I try to also remember that not everyone is Jack Welch.
it’s clear they want people in charge to suffer, because some other powerful person hurt them in the past
sad. start up founder have a lot of benefits but it comes with pain.
pick your poison
I tell potential hires explicitly that this can fail, and that there's a runway, and that it's uncertain. I've seen so many places try to sell people that it's just kicking ass all the way to the bank.
So, when a CEO makes this kind of statement, I would refer back to the initial messaging before getting out my coals and rake. Nobody made anyone sign on to a nascent software company. It absolutely sucks to find yourself without income, but you've got to know your risk tolerance. And, by that, I mean you need to know how well you tolerate risk, and you need to know your exposure. If management wasn't forthright, well, that's really shitty.
The entire industry has had layoffs, regardless of size. In fact, in my experience there's plenty of startups that are still growing and hiring the laid off talent from the big institutions. Apollo was not one of those companies, but it doesn't seem like it being a startup had any impact.
I stand corrected.
But, then again, the CEO does say: "we are not yet profitable: we’ve taken full advantage of outside capital to speed our growth. That was good stewardship in a time when interest rates were low and venture capital was widely available on good terms. But economic conditions have changed and we believe that it’s no longer prudent to rely on outside capital to support us"
I just don't know what to make of it. It was a healthy company.
> it doesn't seem like it being a startup had any impact
A true mystery.
I always get massive push back when I suggest this, but it's the only remedy that makes sense. If you have to layoff 15% of the workforce when the growth was under your command, and you want to take responsibility, then step down. Own your mistake.
Loss in confidence of his employees, fear of mass exodus, pressure from stakeholders, etc...
I don't usually defend CEO's, and it sounds like this one has committed some pretty serious errors, but I certainly would not want to be sending that email out.