Examining a Business Failure - Essay Example

Two other recruitments to follow were that of Rebecca Mark and Jeff Skilling, both of whom were close accomplices of the CEO, and both of them strong enough to head new business lines of Enron. The CEO’s strong political back-up also helped the cause. While these new executives helped Enron spread its wings internationally into the energy market and energy financing, there was an unhealthy inter-personnel rivalry going on in the organization. The exit of Kinder as President fuelled the rivalry further, after Skilling was promoted as President of Enron.

Mergers and acquisitions were a part of life at Enron, and soon the conglomerate, which started as a gas pipeline company, ventured into energy trading, and subsequently launched into new markets such as metals, paper, water and bandwidth. Enron was known as a “Takeover Tycoon” with a “Midas-touch”. However, most of these merger and acquisition decisions were taken not professionally, but for personal interests of the top executives who wanted to flex their own muscles within the organization to out power the other.

Much to the surprise of the corporate world, the Enron ‘bubble’ burst in the year 2001, and investigations into this matter opened a can of worms, revealing that it was not only the Enron executives, but also the legal advisors, their accounting firm and security brokers were a part of the scandal. Keep a fair distance between political influence and business. Too much of political influence on business could prove hazardous. As for Enron’s case, their proximity to the political system helped them easily garner deregulations and other macro issues in their favor, much to the agony of the workers, pensioners and other stakeholders.

Professional service providers such as that of accountants, lawyers, stock brokers, etc. should keep themselves away from ‘personal interests’ gained