Chapter 5 - Ethan’s Management Results Were Actually Good
The board did not want a morality play.
It wanted to decide whether Ethan should run a company.
That required examining what he had done well too.
Revenue had increased nine percent during his interim year.
Two underperforming hotels returned to profitability.
Ethan renegotiated a food-supply agreement that saved approximately $1.8 million annually.
Guest satisfaction improved at four properties.
A costly club renovation came in under budget.
He was good at parts of the job.
Employees described him as decisive in crises.
During a hurricane evacuation at one coastal hotel, Ethan stayed on-site for sixteen hours coordinating transport.
When a longtime concierge developed cancer, Ethan personally approved extended paid leave beyond policy.
A kitchen employee’s apartment burned down.
Ethan quietly paid for three weeks of temporary housing.
Emma included:
all of it.
Ethan almost became angry when he read those findings.
“You make me sound decent.”
“You have done decent things.”
“Then how can you recommend against me?”
“I haven’t told you my recommendation.”
“You know what I mean.”
Emma closed the folder.
“The question isn’t whether you are secretly good or secretly bad.”
“What is it?”
“Whether you can be trusted with authority consistently.”
That was harder.
Then the financial cuts.
Several complaints blamed Ethan for short staffing.
The numbers showed some reductions were necessary.
Whitmore Heritage entered his interim term carrying $23 million in variable-rate debt from pre-pandemic renovations.
Labor costs had increased.
Ethan consolidated administrative functions.
Some jobs disappeared.
That was painful.
Not automatically abusive.
Then Emma discovered one policy decision she did consider serious.
Whitmore Heritage collected mandatory service charges on certain banquets.
Not tips.
Contractual service charges.
Historically, approximately sixty-five percent was distributed through employee incentive pools while the company retained the rest for payroll and administrative costs.
Ethan changed the formula.
Employee share dropped to fifty percent.
Company retention increased.
Legal.
Disclosed in banquet contracts.
Employees hated it.
Ethan told management:
“They already earn hourly pay. Stop acting like service charges belong to them.”
Financially defensible.
Culturally disastrous.
Why?
Because management had previously communicated the service charge as supporting staff compensation.
Employees experienced the reduction as taking money from them even if legally structured differently.
Emma recommended clearer disclosure and a compensation review.
She did not call Ethan a thief.
Several employees had.
The label was inaccurate.
Then one manager admitted she deliberately encouraged staff to file complaints because she wanted Ethan removed over the service-charge change.
Important.
Her complaint about retaliation still contained real evidence.
Her motive did not erase:
it.
The review became more complicated.
That frustrated everyone except Emma.
She preferred complicated if complicated was true.
Then board chair Evelyn asked:
“Can conduct improve?”
Emma answered:
“Sometimes.”
“Would you recommend termination?”
“I’m not finished.”
Ethan’s employment agreement offered another possibility.
No permanent presidency.
No immediate firing.
Extension of interim status with behavioral conditions.
Ethan hated that option more than termination when he first heard it.
“You want me on probation in my own company?”
Evelyn corrected him.
“You keep using those words.”
“What words?”
“My own company.”
She pointed toward the ownership chart.
“You own fourteen percent directly.”
“And beneficial interests.”
“Yes.”
“You know what I mean.”
“I do. That is the problem.”
Then Evelyn asked Ethan:
“If an unrelated president had your financial results and this conduct record, what would you recommend?”
Ethan answered too quickly.
“Fire him.”
Silence.
He had trapped himself.
Then he reconsidered.
“No.”
Emma waited.
“Not immediately. I’d want to know whether he can change.”
That was the first time Ethan discussed his own employment as though his surname were absent.
May you like
The board noticed.
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