RadioShack CEO Resigns 474
xzvf writes to tell us Forbes is reporting that RadioShack CEO David J. Edmondson has resigned. Reeling from a 62% drop in fourth quarter net income the company has announced a sweeping restructuring plan. From the article: "Edmondson said in a separate statement Monday that new leadership was needed so the company's turnaround plan would have the best possible chance to succeed. The revamp announced Friday prompted mixed responses from analysts, who indicated the plan might be successful but, at that time, they doubted Edmondson's ability to pull it off after it became clear he had lied about his education."
Check? (Score:2, Insightful)
It seems like you hear about this more and more in the business world. Don't they even bother to check people out?
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Check? (Score:5, Insightful)
The thing is that he'd been with Radio Shack for 11 years, and become the top sales associate before being offered the job as CEO. Whatever checks might have happened, probably didn't happen 11 years ago. Since then, no one had any reason to question his education. He was a full time employee with an excellent record. What else was necessary?
After he crashed and burned the company, people started paying attention to who he was and where he came from.
Re:Check? (Score:3, Insightful)
The qualifications necessary for a sales position and CEO aren't even close to being the same, and they should have checked his qualifications again before ever giving him the top spot. If you're a salesperson and you screw up big time, they can fire you and give your accounts to
Re:Check? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Check? (Score:5, Insightful)
The other is the peter principle...one rises to the level of one's own inability. Unfortunately, the role of CEO requires very diffierent skills from top sales associate, or even head of marketing. His lack of success as CEO can just as easily be explained by a) inheriting a mess, b) lack of board support, and c) not the right man for the job. The educational question is probably just a hatchet job done to justify his removal after the fact -- "We've got a problem with Bob...find a reason to fire him!"
Re:Check? (Score:5, Interesting)
In the end, tertiary education does not count for as much as some people think it does, especially in the business world. Tertiary education simply primes your for a certain kind of job. It does no actual on the job training. Sure, you got an 4.0 in your business degree, but can you actually sell product and make money?
Once you begin working, that is when your true worth becomes apparent.
Re:Check? (Score:3, Insightful)
Once you begin working, that is when your true worth becomes apparent.
agreed. but in defense of the business degree, they only truly worthwhile business school experience is when you go back to school after having worked in the real world for a time. the executive MBA programs are entirely different from your random business degree, especially in the top schools that are taught by real life successful business peo
Re:Check? (Score:5, Insightful)
I had a professor who was fond of describing the importance of putting your degree on your resume as "important only for landing that first job". After that, it's performance and experience based.
If this CEO fudged his education, it speaks more to his character, judgement, and ethics than his ability sell batteries and solder.
Chihuahuas and CEOs (Score:3, Insightful)
The problem is not that the guy didn't have whatever degree he said he had.
The problem is that he lied to the company about it.
A long time ago, there was someone who had blogged about applying for some kind of very sensitive job at the FBI (or maybe it was the NSA) posting about the interview process. The point is that they asked all kinds of seemingly senseless questions, mixed with questions that he considered in
Re:Check? (Score:5, Interesting)
How does being a good salesman equate with the leadership and organizational ability required of a CEO? I understand, CEOs must to some extent "sell their company", but many great CEOs are very introverted, out-of-the-limelight type of people.
I worked at a Radio Shack (a company owned store) for a few years, and the pressure to sell people expensive items, whether or not they needed them, was intense. Batteries were (and still are) the big killer profit-maker for them. They really beat it into our heads to sell those batteries. Why do you think Radio Shack gave out those coupons for free flashlights all the time? Because if just a few takers would buy batteries for them then they did very well.
Anyone that excels in sales in that type of environment plays dirty. Period. So the fact that he was a leading salesman tells me enough about his character to know that he is not someone that should be in charge.
Dan East
Re:Check? (Score:5, Funny)
They did ask for his mailing address...
Re:Check? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Check? (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Check? (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Check? (Score:2)
Re:Check? (Score:3, Funny)
Since I'm a big husky guy, they usually stammmer and just give me my batteries.
Re:Check? (Score:3, Insightful)
Also, the guy at the register hates doing it, because half the people that go by hate him asking them for it.
Re:Check? (Score:4, Funny)
I live in Poland, so I know for sure.
Re:Check? (Score:2)
Educaton is not always that important. (Score:5, Insightful)
In Business degrees and education usually says the person was able to stick it out for at least 2,4,6,8 years and get a degree and they have the building blocks to learn to do the job. But when you start getting experience then that counts for so much more.
As for Lying about your education what that does is makes it easy to fire you for lying on your Resume if they don't want you. But they are not going to take the effort and check it unless they need a good reason.
Re:Educaton is not always that important. (Score:5, Interesting)
I was a test-engineering consultant for 20-odd years to companies such as Lockheed, Motorola and TI defense divisions, Dell, and so on. At the time, I was one of the top ten people in my (admittedly narrow/specialized) field in the U.S.
Yet, not one of those companies would have hired me as an employee to do the *exact* same work they hired me to do as a consultant because I did not have a degree. I never attended high school, but did get a GED.
(Side note: Tandy was one of my clients in the 1980s and 90s. Every Tandy computer manufactured in the U.S. was production tested with software I wrote and on apparatus I designed and built.)
When I burned out in that field, I switched careers and entered writing/journalism, eventually becomming a magazine editor (circ. ~100k)--still on a contactor/consultant basis. Yet, I'd be hard put to land even a proofreading job as an employee because I am "uneducated."
I hold that this is an unrecognized/unacknowleged form of discrimination and bigotry. Experience and ability should be the primary--if not only--criteria in hiring, not race, sex or orientation thereof--or education.
Re:Educaton is not always that important. (Score:5, Insightful)
Whoa. Race, sex, nationality, and so forth are entirely separate from education since they're what the person is. Unless you're Michael Jackson or a eunuch, you can't change those things and its rightly illegal to discriminate on those lines (AA quotas aside). Education is something you CAN change. It shows an employer that you set your mind to a goal and stuck it out until you got your degree, learning relevant info and getting liberal arts education along the way. 40-50 years ago, you could walk out of high school and land a decent manufacturing job or other such gig with the right hookup. Today, the deck is stacked against you if you follow that route, unless you're heading for a trade school or to the service sector.
Re:Educaton is not always that important. (Score:3, Insightful)
Like all the other programmers out there.
We all feel like we are the best programmer in the world because programming is much like Art, very sugestive. While we can tell the difference from a good programmer and a bad one fairly easilly. (If the program works or not, or they get stuck a lot when making a program, like many into to CS students are), I can write programs that may do the same things as an other good programmer, most likely including you. My method
Re:Educaton is not always that important. (Score:3, Interesting)
I say that not to brag (well, maybe a little), but more to drive the point home when I say that a college degree is a very important
Re:Check? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Check? (Score:2)
Just goes to show you can't trust anybody these days
Re:Check? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Check? (Score:2, Funny)
slogan (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:slogan (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:slogan (Score:3, Insightful)
And the recurring revenue on a few million wireless phone contracts a year is something you'd be pretty damn appreciative of.
Re:slogan (Score:5, Insightful)
I am pretty sure if I had asked him for an LM555C Timer his would have asploded.
Re:slogan (Score:3, Funny)
I saw that film. Quite disgusting.
Re:slogan (Score:3, Informative)
I'm sorry to hear that your radio shack went in the shitter early, or was always there, but radio shack did inde
Hmm.. (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Hmm.. (LINK) (Score:3, Informative)
http://msnbc.msn.com/id/11388447/ [msn.com]
He is paid >1.4M$ per year, and will probably get that as its package.
Bastard.
Long time coming.. (Score:5, Insightful)
Example: In this month's Make Magazine...there's an article on how to receive free (not illegal) satellite channels by using inexpensive materials. Radio Shack should be the source for this material for those who don't want to scrounge!
I know this has been a huge plug for Make Magazine...but for goodness sake, when I used to need some obscure part, I knew it could be had cheaply at the Shack...now you have to order a lot of parts.
Making stuff yourself??? (Score:5, Insightful)
Let's face it. Making stuff yourself gets out of fashion. Remember, kids, only commies make stuff themselves, a good consumer buys it!
Re:Making stuff yourself??? (Score:5, Funny)
And terrorists! Let's not forget the terrorists...
Re:Making stuff yourself??? (Score:2, Funny)
I didn't know MacGyver was a commie...
Re:Making stuff yourself??? (Score:2)
There isn't enough time in the day for Linux and soldering...
Re:Making stuff yourself??? (Score:2)
Once I got to college, I discovered whole new worlds of computer tinkering, and the soldering iron went back into the toolbox.
Since then, I've been trying to juggle back and forth between the two, but computers always still get the
Re:Making stuff yourself??? (Score:3, Insightful)
Today, even if you did get all the necessary ICs, you could not create the prints at home (or, rather, most people couldn't), you can't solder them in (unless you have very special equipment),
Re:Making stuff yourself??? (Score:2)
Re:Long time coming.. (Score:5, Interesting)
Back in the 70s, they moved into Australia and tried to buy their way into market dominance, mainly against a local company, Dick Smith Electronics. DSE got hold of documents that showed that RS were prepared to lose a lot of money (by local standards) to wipe out the competition, then make it up with monopolistic pricing.
It didn't work, not least because they tried to simply transplant an American store to an Australian shop without taking local conditions into account. The publicity from DSE's protests didn't help them, either. Nor did the crap that they were selling!
Ironically, both Tandy Australia and Dick Smith Electronics were bought by Woolworths Australia (a big supermarket-based chain) in 2001. They still operate seperate shops, but there's a lot of overlap of product.
(Not completely on-topic, but moderators please note that I've just admitted to carrying a grudge for over thirty years. Mod me down if you like...) 8-)}
Re:Long time coming.. (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Long time coming.. (Score:2, Interesting)
My first thought was 'Radio Shack! They've always had that stuff.' So I'm all happy and travelled 45 minutes to my nearest not-a-cesspit Radio Shack (I wouldn't touch the local one with a 10-ft pole. Very slimey) and start looking for those kits for radios and
Re:Long time coming.. (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Hear Hear! (Score:3)
I think you'll find that's "for the pedants out there..."
Another version (Score:5, Funny)
According to CNN's article on this topic [cnn.com], Edmundson "originally said he had received a Bachelor of Science degree, but now says he believes -- but cannot document -- that he received a ThG diploma, awarded for completing a three-year degree in theology."
Call it academic theology: "I believe that I got the degree, but cannot document it." Intelligent design, anyone?
The margin's the thing... (Score:5, Insightful)
Plus, what few things they have are all across the board. I always wondered what they held in common, now I see that it was profit margin. A slim range of digital cameras, handheld radios (do people still use these?), stereo wire and connectors and radio control cars (like its a place you bring your kids to?). For each of these if that's what I'm looking for there are other places that come to mind first. Even audio connectors I'll go to some local contractor electronics supplier who can make a custom cable if I need it...
Re:The margin's the thing... (Score:2)
Radio Shack is the convenience store of the technology world.
Re:The margin's the thing... (Score:3, Interesting)
I recently web ordered a security camera and ignored the additional accessories page. The website had a 100' video cable for $18 and a power supply for $10. In a pinch to install the camera I go to Radio Shack.
Radio Shack had a 6' cable for $16. I would have needed 16 of them and 15 connectors to equal the 100' at a cost of $331.00. Not that I would have gone that route but still...
And then there was the power supply. Radio Shack wanted almost $20. We ended up with a different solution that "only" c
His problem was (Score:5, Funny)
Nice. :) (Score:3, Informative)
For those not in the know, Realistic and Optimus are Radio Shack brand names.
What's education got to do with it? (Score:2, Funny)
What was the problem?
Was he hiding the fact that he had an MBA or something?
Re:What's education got to do with it? (Score:2)
Re:What's education got to do with it? (Score:2)
"Roberts said, 'because Dave is a talented and dedicated individual who has made many contributions to the company. Dave recognized that major distractions for the company could negatively impact its efforts to implement the company's turnaround strategy. Undoubtedly, this was a tough decision.' "
These CEO types reall
Re:What's education got to do with it? (Score:3, Insightful)
What did they expect him to do, exorcise the financial reports ?
Realistic (Score:5, Funny)
new leadership was needed so the company's turnaround plan would have the best possible chance to succeed
Sounds like a Realistic(tm) plan to me.
News: There's a new CEO with a tough job.... (Score:5, Insightful)
- Cell phones and 2-way phones are in the big box retailers
- Fry's and others have edged the electronic components and tech tool offerings
- TVs, computers, stereos, and others are the domain of Best Buy, Circuit City, etc...
- Tech toys have also been gnawed on by a slew of retailers
So it's no fun to be Radio Snack, as my uncle calls them. Closing 700 stores is only the first step on a long journey back to health for these guys, as they try to find identity and appeal in the major and tiny markets they once did well in.
Getting smeared because of their ex-CEO's dubious credentials is just another nail in the coffin if they're not careful.
Re:News: There's a new CEO with a tough job.... (Score:2)
I wish they'd stick to their guns and sell stuff like circuit boards, toggle switches, fuses, diodes, and solder. Maybe remote controlled cars and some audio / visual equipment, too. That's fine. All the other junk is just overpriced whats-its, like speaker wire.
~Will
Re:News: There's a new CEO with a tough job.... (Score:3, Informative)
TV, audio all RCA, Magnavox, Sony, Samsung. Which brand isn't mainstream?
Computers are all Compaq.
Re:News: There's a new CEO with a tough job.... (Score:3, Informative)
Links:
Radio Shack History [radioshack...ration.com]
Tandy Leather [tandyleather.com]
Radio Shack still does sell alot of components, but just not as many as there used to be. I have not seen a ole 200 in 1 kit lately. Problem is how do you get kids intrested
Indeed Radio Shack's leather days are over... (Score:2)
They stopped all the cool stuff. (Score:5, Insightful)
Also customer service has went to crap. While they are friendly and everything, when it comes to ask about stuff in the far corner like Is there any RJ45 Connectors aka Cat 5 connectors, I will get a Blank Stare. In the old days the people were far more knowable about all the products then just the top sellers.
And cool stuff could be a lucrative niche (Score:3, Insightful)
If they would consolidate their stores and put one or two in each metro area, focusing on the hobbyist by providing the integrated circuits, connectors, switches, project boxes, breadboards, and so forth, they would be in good shape. How much would you pay for a handfull of 10k resistors if you needed 3 for a project? Talk about profit margin! They won't make money on cell phone plans, TV sets, cordless phones, or Tandy computers. They have a reputatio
Best Thing For Radio Shack (Score:2)
Let's face it even their name is dated.
It's over.
compensation (Score:2)
Re:compensation (Score:2)
He isn't walking away, they gave him the bun's rush, both because he ran it into the ground and because he lied about having a couple of college degrees that he didn't have, one of which aparently is a degree not even offered by the institution he says he got it from.
Comment removed (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Radio Shack and the decline of amateur radio (Score:2)
I know one of the main reasons of this is the wages, as it may be more expensive to pay someone to fix something than to buy it ne
No chance (Score:3, Informative)
Does this finally mean... (Score:2)
The internet claims another victim (Score:2)
When people had no choice before the internet people had to make do and wait for parts to come into stock. Now it's easier to source most of the parts online and usually cheaper. The company's
with a little help from my friends? (Score:3, Funny)
shock and surprise... (Score:2)
...especially today, coming on the heels of their big announcement [ldopa.net]. ~jeff
Where do people buy parts? (Score:2)
I used to enjoy wandering around an electronics shop just checking things out. Heck, even a Radio Spares [rswww.com] catalog is better than nothing, even if they were also overpriced. But I don't know who the best players are in the US.
Re:Where do people buy parts? (Score:5, Informative)
This would make an excellent Ask Slashdot post I would imagine, to get a list going of all these out of the way shops as I'm sure there's a lot of slashdotters with favorite places they know about.
The closest to a national presence would probably be Fry's which has a pretty decent range of stuff if you live in a state where they operate (mostly west coast from what I understand).
Re:Where do people buy parts? (Score:2)
How well I remember buying the packages of two resistors of the same value, even though I only needed one, knowing full well that only one would be within tolerance and the other would be open or a few orders of magnitude off.
Radio Shack Slogan (Score:2)
or my personal favorite:
"You've got money, we've got pockets!"
Motto (Score:5, Interesting)
I tried to get some parts for an oscillator once and the guy just looked at me like I was crazy. I thought in the back of my mind, "This is Radio Shack right....??"
slickdeas (Score:2, Interesting)
(trying to make their numbers look better)
Dell does the same thing every quarter.
You'd think people would have gotten the message (Score:4, Interesting)
This isn't the first person to be exposed for lying about academic credentials and it probably won't be the last. Nonetheless, after so many have been keelhauled for doing this, I'm surprised that people still lie in writing about their academinc credentials and surprised that there are still companies not checking for this, particularly for executive candidates. No doubt some of the Radio Shack board have egg on their faces as well, especially in light of the drastic cuts that ananlysts suggest are needed.
Academic credentials are about the easiest qualification to check for. Just call the school. Either the candidate has the degree they claim to have or they do not. There's no shade of gray. That's why it's so stupid to lie about this. It's easy to check and there's no wiggle room. Why then do so many do it? Why then are there companies that don't check for this?
RadioShack = Dollar store of electronics (Score:5, Insightful)
Even the name brands they sell tend to be the low end economy models that Sony, Panasonic, etc will sell at Walmart or grocery stores, of course for a far cheaper price then RadioShack.
There may have been a time when you can pass off a cheap Chinese boom box for $100, and that is when RadioShack raked in the money, but these days people are a little more discriminating in the quality of electronics they buy, and RadioShack hasn't offered those better quality products. They still insist on selling that cheap Chinese boom boxes for $100.
RadioShack should simply refocus on selling batteries and remote control cars, its about all they do well. Stop trying to sell cheap home theater and stereo equipment and televisions, drop computers period, and focus on smaller electronic gadgets that you can't find elsewhere. Either that, our start offering high end stuff you can't find anywhere else, open up a niche market that walmart, Best Buy and Target can't touch.
Just, don't go on as business as usual. It obviously isn't working, and those no-name brands you keep carrying and selling for the same price as name brands are not making you money.
You've got questions? (Score:2)
We saved millions not switching to linux (Score:2)
"After an extensive evaluation in which RadioShack compared Windows® and Linux, the company selected Microsoft® Windows Server System(TM) and Windows XP Embedded."
Actually if they would just get out of the comodity market they got themselves into and start actually carrying cool shit again they might stand a chance.
It all started when... (Score:2, Funny)
Once Upon A Time(tm)... (Score:4, Insightful)
Ever wired a commercial audio job at some remote site in East Belt Buckle [insert state here]? In the middle of the job, there was always some part needed, or something that would not work right - and even East Belt Buckle would have a Radio Shack - problem solved...
Spin the time machine to the present... the CEO isn't quite what was sold to the company... The product line is thin, cheap, and out of step with the times. The sales clerks demand your life's personal information if you want to buy a $.25 resistor or some wire, or if your wife just went there to buy an odd-size battery. They are not in the consciousness of the public (along the lines of CompUSA, Best Buy, Circuit City, et. al.). Their prices are not anything to write home about. Their hours are generally not as flexible as the Huge Mart stores against which they compete. And to top it all off, the cool little DIY parts are getting so thin that you can't go to RS and dream up a little cool electronic thing any more.
Earth to Radio Shack: Do more than get rid of one or two brass... Figure out what America is after and then adapt to that. I don't like to nay-say the health of a company, but even I can see that Radio Shack has become the Kodak(TM) Instant Film and the 8-Track superstore that no-one needs it to be.
They couldn't be losing *THAT* much (Score:2)
Radio Shack = Cellphone store (Score:3, Insightful)
You would go into the store, and the one or two people working there would be on the phone busy trying to get someone's cellphone service working. You would wait for 20 minutes to check out. They didn't care if you were buying $10 of stuff, since they were in the process of selling $100 cellphones plus the monthly service.
The ironic thing is that despite leaving the chip selling business, RadioShack is one of the few places you can drop by and pick up a wire wrap tool and wire wrap wire. But I need to do that once or twice a year.
R/S has no differentiator now. If you want a cellphone, the carriers have their own stores that are better staffed and more familiar with the products. If you want home electronics, it is hard to beat Best Buy, and for that matter the low-end stuff is at Target as well. The one differentiator of R/S in the past was the electronics parts, which have been gutted.
Radio Shack should pounce on microcontrollers (Score:3, Insightful)
Makes you think.
Then there's the whole embedded linux thing!
Radio Shack turned their back on hobbiests; I probably owe my EE degree to Forrest Mimms and his great books that radio shack distributed in the 80's. Now they sell cheap crap from China and Cell Phones.
Re:I Hate RadioShack (Score:5, Informative)
You may read and post on
Re:I Hate RadioShack (Score:2, Informative)
If Radioshack goes under, you'll still be able to get all sorts of weird parts at relatively short notice (albeit not immediately).
Clap, Clap, Clap Bravo! (Score:2)
Re:I Hate RadioShack (Score:3, Insightful)
That, combined with the trend in consumer electronics to go from expensive but repairable to cheap but unfixable (can't get parts, can't get service manuals), means that where I live we've gone from two competing "parts houses" (where service technicians used to get tubes and transistors and such) to none.
Re:I Hate RadioShack (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:I Hate RadioShack (Score:3, Interesting)
I'm not allowed to work at a corporate-managed RadioShack ever again (I quit without notice).
Radio Shack pretends to care about its customers. It's evident from the way every meeting goes, all the way down to the store manager with his employees. The entire focus is on SELLING BIG-TICKET THINGS. If you're in here for batteries, I should offer you a cellular plan. Why? Because deep down, you want one, and you're just waiting for me to offer it to you. Their
Re:I Hate RadioShack (Score:2)
73 de KG2V