First blood: Telecom CTO falls on sword
The first Telecom blood has been spilt over the XT outage saga.
The company has just announced that Frank Mount, its chief transformation officer, has resigned.
The industry veteran (pictured), who has spent most of his career in his native US, joined Telecom in June 2008, after holding a variety of chief technology officer (CTO) roles at major US and UK telcos.
Fall guy?
Mr Mount began his career at AT&T in 1967, putting him in the near-retirement bracket. It's still unclear, however, if Mr Mount will serve as a fall guy for XT's troubles, of if there's more carnage to come.
When appointing Mr Mount, Telecom chief executive Paul Reynolds said “Frank has ... exhaustive knowledge of the full spectrum of telecommunications and IP technologies. This equips him perfectly to execute our long-term technology strategy."
Mr Mount replied with, “As a technologist it was a challenge I couldn’t pass up and I can’t wait to get started at Telecom."
Crisis meeting
Further developments are expected this afternoon, when Telecom chief executive Paul Reynolds hosts a briefing. The press conference will follow a crisis meeting among Telecom executives being held this morning, designed to formulate a new XT action plan.
Mr Mount's resignation was accepted by Dr Reynolds this morning and is effective immediately.
Telecom gave no reason for the resignation, beyond the oblique "it was in the interest of our customers."
Yesterday, Alcatel-Lucent country manager Steve Lowe also resigned. Again, no reason was given for his departure.
“In the interests of our customers, our team and New Zealand, I have regretfully accepted Frank’s resignation,” said Dr Reynolds in a statement.
Hospital pass?
“I am pleased to announce that CIO (chief information officer) David Havercroft will assume the responsibility for all network and IT operations from today and CFO Russ Houlden will carry interim responsibility for our Shared Services operations and Technology Strategy.
“I want to acknowledge with personal gratitude Frank Mount's enormous contribution to Telecom over the past 18 months. He has worked tirelessly and selflessly for our customers and for Telecom people. The successful delivery of Telecom's Crown Undertakings schedule on Operational Separation represents one of the most significant operational and IT programmes in the company's history and is re-shaping the industry. I wish Frank well for the future,” he said.
Telecom shares (NZX: TEL) were down 1 cent to $2.34 in mid morning trading.
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Comments and questions15
Good on you Mr Mount. It seems you are the only senior manager there involved who has the personal courage to be accontable to your customers.
However I am disappointed in your ex organisation"s seeming attempts to scapegoat you alone for this debacle. Where is the responsibility at the senior level above you?
Did nobody hear the claim made on talk back (newstalkzb) the othernight about at least one insider deliberately sabotaging things from the inside as a payback to Telecom for some undetailed grudge or something along those lines ?? IF this is true it hardly seems fair that well qualified people are " falling on their swords" to make someone up the top-plus affected XT users- feel better. we NEED skilled people--we should not crucify them IF they are not to blame in any way.
Not only has Paul Reynolds stayed quiet-but I believe he is making an appearance later today- BUT what about the highly paid Wayne Boyd-C.O.T.B.-where are you Wayne ???
Its not at the senior level above Frank. It is the next level down (Investment Manager layer) that needs the scrutiny.
I am a bit mystified as to how Frank Mount's departure can be dressed up as Telecom getting its house in order. This charade resolves nothing.
and this is just spin and window dressing then Telecom have learned nothing and continue to put show over substance.
Needs an independent enquiry.
Of course there has to be a fall guy and that is exactly what has happened. There will be no independent inquiry - this is a private company, not a Govt Dept! Renoylds will give us all the PR crap today. Then they will get on and hopefully get this screwed network fixed. Trouble is we don't have a truely competitive market here in NZ, albeit we try to pretend we do. Perhaps the Govt needs to say it as it is and start to regulate our Telecon industry. otherwise crap like this will continue, we will continue to be overcharged for our services and there is very little we can do about it.
a public enquiry
Everytime the network goes down - a head must roll.
It is a public one last time I looked at the sharemarket.
Teleocom management should hire an independant reviewer to investigate on behalf of shareholders and customers who clearly have lost faith in what the management are telling them. It would be a first step to restore trust in this company.
Telecom's market capitalisation today is a fraction of what it was sold for nearly 20 years ago, if you adjust for inflation. NZ has regulated Telecom to death (although some of the reduction in value comes from more competition and maturing of the market).
Faced with gutted value, Telco's cant afford to build quality networks any more, so they do it on the cheap, and take the risk. Telecom lost.
Part of the blame for the failure of XT must lie with the regulations forced on Telecom. You cant kick a company to hell then expect top quality services.
advises the govt the regs won't work and don't proceed with shonky developments? They had a choice. Take a stand at the time and don't later blame the rules.
I was floating on a shipping container in the Tasman sea last night and I could get through clear as a bell.
Everyone in this comments section seems to be so self righteous when it comes to putting the boot into Telecom, yet I doubt many would be anywhere near as confident if they were in Paul Reynolds shoes.
Paul and Telecom have been open, transparent and contrite about these issues from the get-go. Funnily enough I dont seem to recall this being the case with any other telcos when they've had big issues to front up to.
There is an independent investigation happening and Telecom seem to be going out of their way to try and put things right. What else do you people want?
Lets get real eh?
I think at this point we need to wait for the reccomendations of the independent review before speculating further.
Among the reasons people "put the boot into Telecom" are the nauseating preening and posturing of so many of its management - sorry, "world class management", the absurd sums they are paid for such mediocre perfomance and the overhyping of the XT network with those ridiculous ads incorporating absurdly airbrushed photos of Richard Hammond. All this arrogance set them up for an almighty fall.
Noone denies that Paul Reynolds has got an incredibly tough job - probably not the leisurely semi-retirement he'd planned - but he does get $5m+ a year. Lots of people work under huge pressure for 1% of that .....
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