Bosses under fire

Extraordinary times. Today we learn that a group calling itself Bank Bosses Are Criminal attacked the Edinburgh home of the former Royal Bank of Scotland chief Fred Goodwin.

After smashing windows they then sent emails to media organisations warning of more attacks against bank bosses.

Goodwin, who left RBS late last year with a $1.48 million per year pension, despite the company’s huge losses, was targeted. “We are angry that rich people like him are paying themselves a huge amount of money and living in luxury while ordinary people are made unemployed, homeless and destitute.”

Then over in France a group of workers at a 3M factory have taken their manager hostage to protest against their redundancy payouts.  The workers have held their boss in his office for two days to force him to improve their redundancy packages.

What does all that mean for Australia? Banks are unlikely to be the butt of such attacks largely due to Rudd’s guarantee, and as bolshie as Australian workers are, it would be highly unlikely they would lock up their boss.

But the growing anger being directed at bosses worldwide is a worry, and as Bob Gottliebsen argues today, symptomatic of a lack of trust in the business community. Makes you wonder about how employees may deal with pay rise freezes this year.

Might it feed into a growing resentment towards employers?