Saturday, January 07, 2006

Walmart former Vice Chairman to plead guilty to Federal wire fraud and Tax evasion.

Thomas Coughlin, who was Walmarts vice chairman and number two man, is going to plead guilty to the fraud and Tax evasion charges . Coughlin left Walmart in 2005 after accusations surfaced after an investigation that he stole as much as $500,000 from the Monster chain which includes Sams Club.
He joined the company 25 years ago as head of security. His start was specialized in the area of loss prevention.

You would think that a number two man would earn enough to not have to steal. But what better way to cover your tracks than to be on every board you can and be head of security. If I were he and had held that position with his pay, I would have treated the company as if it were my own.
At past jobs I have been trusted with and watched out for things as such in my area. In fact, at one company in Atlanta, I was given the job of finding and weeding out and correcting issues related to company theft. It was not an easy task as some of these people I had worked with for years and never in my wildest dreams would have believed a couple of them to be thieves. They had violated my trust in them and had taken advantage of me by earning my respect and trust only to be sneaking around stealing.
In the end though, I came up with a way to track such things and kept a close eye on it. Our inventory at tax time looked the best it had in years I was told. It even took less time to complete. The new crew of old and new employees and their attitudes were better and a happier work place resulted. Unlike previous managers, I actually took time to talk with each of them on a dailey basis. I did things that I had always said, when I was just a order puller, that I would do different if I was the boss. Later when given the job after working my way up, they the employees could come to me and talk, whether it was work related or personal, with the strictest of confidence. Each was treated with respect as I had always felt was missing before. One thing that had been said to me many times was that you need to keep yourself fairly removed from the employees or they will have no respect for you. Well, I found that being involved with them on a human level actually was much better for me, them and the company. My reward at the end of each year was a bonus that I shared with each of them. To me they had earned it just as well as I and if not for the employees I never would have received a bonus.
I've been approached with bribes in the past to overlook certain things that I knew were wrong. I never accepted any and if I was suspicious of activity that someone else was I reported it and made note of it. Although all this looking out for the companies and their well being was over looked. They knew I was honest and could be trusted. But neither of them were appreciative enough to reward my efforts with better wages. Even so I did what was right. Guess that is why I'll never be a rich man and make good wages or gain corporate status. Honest workers are the ones that are paid the least and taken advantage of in the old way of management.

To this day I still have two letters of recommendation from my former bosses at that company. They tell of the tough task that I had been given to overhaul the warehousing and trucking. I left them with a team that worked well together in all aspects

2 comments:

Bill said...

So how did the camping trip go?

It's been a while, thought I'd drop in and see what you were up too. I hope your holidays were great and from the sounds of it you've got a lot going on for this new year...

Good luck with everything you've got going on!

WooleyBugger said...

did not get to do it last weekend but this weekend is a go. Everything is set and planned for fun fun fun. Can't wait until friday and the boy is very excited too. Popcorn, movie and games plus sleeping on the floor in sleeping bags. Heck, we even have one of those plug in fires to make it complete.