The Short Tenure and Abrupt Ouster of Banking’s Sole Black C.E.O.
Tidjane Thiam made Credit Suisse profitable again. But the Swiss rejected him as an outsider, and a sudden scandal took him down.
Fritz Charles
104d ago
The Short Tenure and Abrupt Ouster of Banking’s Sole Black C.E.O. - The New York Times
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This is what Tidjane Thiam had to face in Swiss banking - from a @nytimes piece on his tenure at Credit Suisse by @katekelly nytimes.com/2020/10/03/bus… pic.twitter.com/XDx62AGuBG
A party featuring a Black entertainer sweeping the floor to music and white guests wearing Afro wigs was just one disturbing moment for Tidjane Thiam as Credit Suisse's C.E.O.
In summary, according to the NYT:
Ivorian CEO and Pakistani Executive Vice President at giant bank get involved in a scandalous clash, but white Swiss people are to blame.
Almost anywhere you are in the world, being Black means navigating impossible standards for acceptance. Two great @nytimes pieces illustrate that:
1) @katekelly w/story of former Credit Suisse CEO who lifted the bank financially but wasn’t “Swiss” enough
“Their unspoken message, he said, was: You cleaned up the mess. Now leave. It’s a pattern known as the “glass cliff” — the tendency of institutions to install women and minorities as leaders only when there’s big trouble, and then shunt them aside.”
This is a fascinating, deeply reported piece by @Kate Kelly about race and power at the top of the financial world
"It's the essence of injustice to hold against someone what they are..." Tidjane Thiam. I'm sure Mr Thiam had his faults but can't help wondering after reading this, if & how different his story might have been if he had been white. H/T @ronkelawal
What a tragedy! It's a small, yet powerful, example that if you're a black person in certain industries, there's literally no room for mistakes. You have to be unhumanly perfect & flawless. You're watched: 1 mistake, regardless how small, and you're out.
Interesting new chapter of the Thiam Saga by @katekelly:
The Short Tenure and Abrupt Ouster of Banking’s Sole Black C.E.O. nytimes.com/2020/10/03/bus… via @nytimes
"The Zurich press rode him for not appearing sufficiently Swiss," writes @katekelly in this terrific story of a banker, the only Black CEO of a top-tier bank, who succeeded but got sacked anyway.
A quick read worth a lot of thought. Swiss Banks aren’t an anomaly in all this, just one more example.
A must read. The Short Tenure and Abrupt Ouster of Banking’s Sole Black C.E.O.