mr. michael webber analyst at wells fargo

Bacon was handed a departure agreement, which included one year of severance pay, and given a few days to respond.īacon's decision to leave, after more than 13 years at Wells Fargo, brought him a feeling of calm and relief. Hardison and Callahan seemed to have anticipated this possibility. Hardison and Callahan could have sought Bacon's advice on the best way to execute their plan, he felt, but they hadn't.Īs the meeting wound down, Bacon indicated that he would likely take a severance package rather than accept a reduced role. Hardison and Callahan did not have plans for a group that provided support services for the two parts of the corporate investigations unit. These people, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said that the investigations unit was moved because it was a risk function, not a human relations function.Īs the September 2014 meeting progressed, it became apparent to Bacon that the reorganization was not well conceived. But people familiar with her thinking contested the idea that she orchestrated Bacon's departure in order to lessen her own involvement with the sales misconduct problem, as well as the notion that budgetary factors were at play. Hardison declined to comment for this article. In addition, he believed that Hardison wanted to wash her hands of the investigations unit, which had been trying to get the bank's senior leadership team to pay more attention to the widening sales misconduct problem. He figured the reorganization would save money in Hardison's budget at a time when Wells executives were under pressure to cut spending.

The risk management group was dealing with regulatory problems that had arisen elsewhere in the bank, and Bacon couldn't see a good business rationale for the reorganization, which he regarded as the dismantling of a unit that was performing well.īacon suspected two other forces were at work.

Meanwhile, the employee investigations side would be moved out of human resources and into a risk management unit.īacon was offered the opportunity to lead the latter team, but he viewed that option unfavorably. The part that provided physical security at Wells Fargo branches and other company properties would join the bank's corporate real estate group. His 400-plus-member team was going to be split in two. Instead, the two senior executives had summoned Bacon to inform him of a reorganization. Hardison, who'd been with the bank since 1993, was Callahan's protégé, one of a number of executives whose careers Callahan had helped advance.Īs it turned out, this meeting was not about staffing levels. She was also known to have the ear of Stumpf, so much so that other executives sometimes used her as an intermediary, figuring that the CEO would react better to a message that came from Callahan. She was respected for her intelligence, her institutional knowledge and her people skills. To his surprise, Chief Administrative Officer Pat Callahan was also awaiting his arrival.Ĭallahan was nearing her retirement after nearly three decades at Wells Fargo. When he reached the end of the hall, he entered Hardison's office. Most of them had been colleagues 15 years or more, which meant that Wells Fargo's senior ranks had both continuity and a shortage of new voices who might challenge the status quo.Ĭarrie Tolstedt, the hyperintense head of retail banking, sat two doors down from CEO John Stumpf, who always wore a suit and tie, and never seemed to have a hair out of place.Īs Bacon exited the elevator, he turned left. Inside its relatively small rectangular footprint were the offices of the bank's most powerful executives. The wood-paneled C-suite at 420 Montgomery Street in San Francisco's financial district had an old-school feel. He wanted a larger budget, but he worried that he was instead going to be told he'd have to make do with his existing staff of 105 investigators - or worse, that he was going to lose positions. Bacon, who in dozens of recent interviews provided an inside account of how the bank's high-ranking executives mishandled the phony-accounts problem, felt that he needed to add staffers to the investigations team.

Mr. michael webber analyst at wells fargo