You decide.

Or simply a deeply dismal executive.

Why can't he be both?

For those interested: www.guardian.co.uk/media/interac ... olin-myler Not sure I'd spot anything of great significance if I skim read it (indeed I haven't yet).

For those interested: www.guardian.co.uk/media/interac ... olin-myler Not sure I'd spot anything of great significance if I skim read it (indeed I haven't yet).

Well this is true, But that doesn't explain the galloping gob rot that he keeps spewing.

Everytime he opens his mouth he digs his hole even deeper.

His latest gem is when he was confronted with the fact that it has been proven that he recived the e-mail's that he clamied he didnt see was that he recived them on his blackberry on a saturday and he just didn't read them, Even though it came from an editor at the NOTW with links to mails and letters from lawyers.

Even a dismal exec could think of a better excuse than that surely.

It was sent on a Saturday. Presuambly, he was not in the habit of being office bound on Saturdays so he would know it would have come to his Blackberry. I see nothing odd in that. At the end of the day its just an update on a legal matter which his in house team were dealing with him. Myler's brief bullet points for his attention were suggesting a meeting. Why would he read all the detail underneath when he could be updated in a couple of minutes in person?

Don't be so stupid. Having contradicted his people twice in committee, he now has to claim he never read anything which would mean he did not tell the truth. His only alternative would be to put his hands up and say "OK, fair cop, I knew". To suggest that he got an email but only read a bit of it is as ludicrous as it gets. And if you consider the seriousness of the subject, then Murdoch not reading all of it simply beggars belief. You must be the world's most gullible man if you believe that.

Anyway, the email to Myler proves he lied. If he had not previously discussed the Taylor case with Myler, how could he be getting "an update"? If "it is as bad as we feared" why would we have feared it being bad, if in fact we knew feck all about "it"? The natural reply then would have been - "Colin - eh? What are you talking about"?

The emails from Crone to Myler, which Myler simply forwarded on to Murdoch, are similarly full of ammunition. What - a deal to be offered that's going to cost £700K, and the way to inform your gaffer of it for the first time is just to forward an email? Do you really credit that?

That email also refers to the "further nightmare scenario" relating to the hacking of the PFA solicitor's phone. Again - do you seriously believe that such a fundamentally grave disclosure would first be made to Murdoch by a forwarded email? Really?

The copy email from Julian Pike, the solicitor, states on only the 4th line that Gordon Taylor wanted to show that what happened to him was "rife throughout the organisation". This email states that Taylor's lawyer wants over £1m to settle or else his client wants to see his =#800000infernal organisation "hung out to dry". You actually credit that anyone would "inform" their boss for the first time of such a case, at such an advanced stage, simply by a forwarded email?

I'm sorry, but I don't believe a word he says. And if he has not been dissembling, then he must be the world's worst manager, and must have had some of the craziest staff.

He lied and thinks everyone else is as thick as donkey droppings. To imply that someone that senior would pay less attention to an email because it was the weekend is laughable. I say he thinks; obviously he wouldn't have drafted the letter, his lawyers would have. The apology for 'not raising this sooner' was a nice touch.

You might want to amend that mate, before Mirror Group Newspapers coming a -hunting

I'd also presume that the CEO of a publication that is only ever published on a Sunday might not simply switch off his brain on a Saturday, the day that that publication goes to press and delivery.

On the other hand that would imply that he had a brain to switch on.

I think all it shows is that people in charge of companies are generally just like me and you, some a re good some are not.

Generally, in the past 10 -15 years people getting into positions of power are either good ass lickers of from the family of the owners of the firm, very few actually have any long term experience of making companies work or running them with any kind of competency.

Having worked for 6 FTSE 100 companies, it's clear to me that the vast majority of good business managers have all been made redundant taken over by people who can talk a good talk.

I've said many times on this forum that just because one person is a great/ruthless/evil/magnificent/whatever, but SUCCESSFUL businessman, it doesn't mean his descendants will be the same.

I've seen many great businesses go to the wall when a less able family member takes over.

How can this be true? Surely the vast remuneration packages on offer ensure that the "best talent" is attracted.

Never mind that: if you read certain posts on this forum, you'll know that all managers know best, all managers are good and all managers are infinitely better than their workers – especially when said workers organise into parasitic unions.

haha the Company chairman role of large conglomorates, is like a merry go round of old boys.

He can't help it. He was building a teleportation device, and just as he was about to test it a small but fully formed Digby Jones got into the machine with him, leading to this strange human/Digby hybrid.

I've often wondered about the value of our CEOs. Last month, a number of worthless, bone idle, parasitic public sector staff went on strike and, despite their worthlessness, there was an obvious impact on the economy and on the country in general. What would happen if all CEOs went on strike tomorrow? Would anyone notice? Given what James Murdoch appears to have "not known", you have to wonder.

And yet when you look (again) at Germany and the Mittelstand (I posted a link on another thread) companies, they rarely seem to fail when one generation hands over to the next. Maybe it's a mind-set that they are only custodians of the company and ownership is not an end in itself?

If you read the emails, JRM replied within 3 minutes of CM having sent him the email. He's presumably socialising / on the move at the time - he will have read JUST the few lines from CM and so it is, IMO, entirely credible that he did not read the rest. His reply only talks about meeting or CM calling him. Much easier for a quick chat than reading all that guff.

Managers, as opposed to leaders, are just a waste of space IMO. I appreciate they are needed in big organisations, but in most smaller companies they are just a waste of a salary. They get in the way, stifle initiative and generally deduct value.

Not necessarily. There's only so much you can get from interviewing someone, and the job invariably goes to the applicant who talks the best game.

Hello! Me Again!

whilst I agree that he probably didnt have time to read the full chain before responding to the meeting request, the content of the email from Myler was provocative enough for Murdoch to enquire what was going on if he didn't know already. By reading the top email and responding he must have known what was going on, or would have made it his business to find out ASAP.

...and in any case you'd expect the sender to ask again for a proper response to such a serious email, if I sent my boss an email that potentially left the business and directors open to criminal prosecution and he just replied "OK ta" then I'd be covering my own a[irs[/ie and getting him to confirm that he'd actually read it properly.

I can't believe we're even having this discussion. The email starts with "Unfortunately, it is as bad as we feared." There is no escaping that. Even if Murdoch bizarrely never read any further than that, what is this "it" which is as bad as "we" "feared"? The copied emails make it crystal clear.

Whether he read the copies at that time or not, is not even the main point, since the question isn't what he read, but what he knew. That sentence screams that the sender is referring to something already well known to the recipient. the mere fact of simply forwarding, without explanation or comment, such nuclear emails, says a thousand words but ask yourselves this:

If Murdoch had no idea of what was as bad as he had feared, what would his natural email response have been? I suggest not "No worries".

For interest, I tried reading the 3 emails, and then typing out Murdoch's response on my Blackberry. I don't know how fast Murdoch can read though i'd imagine his scan reading will be reasonable. I don't know how fast he can type on his Blackberry. But anyway, the whole process took me 2m 40s. So I don't think that the timescale he is talking about means anything.

Indeed, just reading the email and not the forwards, then replying, would take 1 minute not 2 so the timescale is to me a red herring.

And beyond that, let's say he had at the point of replying, for some reason not yet read or digested the full monty. How, given the dire claim "unfortunately, it is as bad as we feared", would he simply not bother reading any further even in a few minutes, or later? Who could resist the urge to know WHAT was as bad as we feared, or WHY it was as bad as we feared?

Final test: pretend you're James Murdoch, and know little or nothing. Then pretend you get that email on your Blackberry. Read it, as if for the first time, and then ask yourself what your reaction/reply would have been, if you really knew nothing about "it".

Meanwhile back at the ranch (or should I say the High Court) Glenn Mulcaire's case against NGN has started today. He is suing them for breach of contract. Readers may remember that NGN was paying sums of money to Mulcaire (IIRC for no reason at all) until Murdoch's appearance before the Committee, whereupon the payments as soon as made public abruptly stopped. these were, according to Mulcaire, to pay his legal costs, and to indemnify him in regard to any damages awarded against him. As he claims that was the agreement between him and NGN.

"Glenn Mulcaire's case is that the defendant did agree to pay his costs, the agreement is enforceable and the defendant did not have the right to terminate it," his barrister told the court.