My CEO Life

Well all good things must come to an end.  Last week I was fired from the CEO position at the REA Group.  Now this was and was not a surprise.  The Board and i have had differences for a while and they decided that they wanted someone else to take the business to the next level. This is their choice and i wish them all the best for the future.  As the third largest shareholder, i will be watching eagerly from the sidelines at the future growth of the business.

Now i dont want to go into whether this was or was not the right decision for the busness.  In many ways it is probably the right decision for the business.  There is a gap between the culture of the board and the culture of the business and it is time for someone else to bridge that gap while maintaining the long term growth of the business.  What i can say is that i am proud of my record of growing the business from revenues of $4m to over $150m, from EBITDA losses of $6m to EBITDA profits over $30m and increasing the market cap from $8m to over $500m … all in 7.5 years!

What is more interesting is how the whole process was handled.  Now i am not going into the details however it would be fair to say that it was not handled well.  I have been with the business for 7.5 years and have built it from a small, mainly Melbourne team of 25 people to a global team of 750 (or so).  In doing this we have really injected a strong culture  (see my previous entry on culture).

Now last week i was summonded to a hotel room in town, asked for my access pass and told not to go back to the office and that my desk would be packed up and couriered to me – 7.5 years over in a flash.  I was not to say goodbye to the team.  Now this is so different to the culture internally and caused significant shock and amazement amongst the team – i ended up with over a hundred emails, notes, sms’ and phone calls from team members around the world – many of them expressing shock and amazement at what had happened.  Everyone wanted to catch up and go for a drink.  So we ended up having to have “unofficial” drinks – a week of them! 

The point is, i am still a large shareholder, i have lots of institutional knowledge and Australia is a small market – it would have made sense to discuss how to exit in an open way and ensure that there would be a smooth transition.  This would have been best for everyone – most importantly the team.

1. The Era’s of Growth of the REA Group

   The company i run is called the REA Group.   The business was started in 1995 in the garage of one of the founders in the Melbourne suburb of Doncaster.  In 2000 it came within a few weeks of closing and...

2. How to Retain Great People – Part 2

   I was recently asked the question “how do you attract and retain excellent employees?”.  This entry looks at the second part of the equation. Firstly, you need to make sure that your team members are paid at least at the...

3. Pennies from Heaven

   Have you ever had on of those days when things go right and more importantly, something great just pops up and you cant say no. Well i had one of those days last week.  I was working away and received...

4. Conferences – Getting the Most Out of Them

   So, for those that have been following my blog will realise that last week we had our half year annual conference. Wed / Thurs / Fri last week we ran many sessions for people from all parts of the business. ...

5. About the Company I Work For

   OK … i am going to tell you a little about the company so that you have some context. We have been in business for around 10 years and operate in the internet space. We provide a range of services...