Today in consequences of career limiting moves, a former EY auditor settled charges with the SEC that he traded on insider information about a merger of a client that he was staffed on.
Now, I know you’re thinking, “Wow, that was dumb.” And yes, that was incredibly bad decision on the part of Nima Hedayati, but the details are truly worthy of #smh (which I never condone using except in extreme circumstances):
Out-of-the-money call options? Trading on your fiancee’s account? Tipping your mom? And then, according to the order, mom “sent him $2,000 as a ‘thank you’ gift.” Lots of bad choices here, people.
It’s been suggested that he wasn’t paying attention during training, but even so, I think auditors actively ignoring ethics/misusing client information videos know that insider trading on a client is wrong? Is there a plausible excuse here? I’ll wait why you think it over.
Naturally, EY fired Hedayati when it found out about his little stunt. I like to imagine the person sitting across from him, glaring, until Hedayati coughs and says, “I’ll just get my stuff and go.”
Officially, it appears that it’s just half of the Canadian Tux. You can show up in the jacket if you want but we’d advise you lose it while at the office.
Oh right, showing up at your client from head to toe in denim is not advisable so that eliminates a fair share of you. As for the rest of you, kindly schlep that extra outfit with you just in case. You never know when you’ll need the biz-pro or biz-casual uniform handy. On a somewhat related note, it’s not entirely clear is if the Texas Tuxedo is allowed.
Allowing denim on Fridays during busy season is probably not unprecedented but it may be enough to get some of you through the next 30-ish days. Enjoy.
This morning we learned from a couple of sources that the big guy will be calling it a career officially on June 30, 2013 and the firm will announce a new CEO-elect at some point in early 2012.
Here’s JT’s message to the troops:
I have written to all our partners to let them know about my plans to retire from Ernst & Young on 30 June 2013.
Every year, our Global Executive (GE) considers the priorities and initiatives we feel Ernst & Young should focus on in the upcoming year, and these priorities are then approved by our Global Advisory Council (GAC), the top governance body of Ernst & Young.
Periodically, we also take a longer look at our strategy and vision, and involve the GAC in this as well. In July, we informed our partners that we were beginning such a long-term strategic review. The GE and I believe that our new strategy and leadership-succession plans are inextricably linked, and we agreed that June 2013 would be the right time for me to retire.
This is a normal process and the timing has worked out perfectly. I will be 58 years old, which is the normal early retirement age for many of our partners. By then, we will be implementing our new strategy and it’s right that a new leader should steer this implementation.
We are starting a robust process to identify the man or woman who will succeed me, in accordance with our regulations. We intend to identify a new Chairman and CEO elect during the first part of 2012. What I feel very good about is that we’re the type of organization that continually develops large numbers of great leaders, so I see many men and women who could lead Ernst & Young successfully into the future.
This is not a retirement letter or speech to you all, as there is much to do before June 2013. However, I wanted to be very open with you about our plans. Thank you for your continued support as we continue both our strategy and succession-planning process.
James S. Turley
Chairman and CEO
UPDATE: Ernst & Young provided us with the following statement:
In a communication to all Ernst & Young partners worldwide on 10 November 2011, James S. Turley, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Ernst & Young confirmed that he will retire as planned, aged 58, on 30 June 2013. The succession process to decide a new Chairman and CEO-elect is now underway and will conclude in early 2012, no later than April.
So after riding out Lehman, handing out a lot of trophies, and inspiring the greatest lyric in the history of Big 4 employee produced videos, (I’m sure there are other accomplishments too) Jimbo will ride off into the Black and Yellow sunset. This seems like an appropriate tribute: