Yes, agreed -- this is unbelievably awful executive management. Ben should be asking some questions here instead of threatening to fire Steve because Tim hasn't been filling in his TPS reports. What's especially unconscionable here is that Ben is threatening to terminate both Tim _and_ Steve. Can you imagine Steve's ensuing conversation with Tim? Or worse, the resulting 1:1 marathon held by Tim with his team at the tip of Steve's bayonet? This is just wrong in every conceivable direction -- Ben has in a stroke created an organization ruled by fiat, bureaucracy and fear. If Tim is a problem -- if his team loathes him because he refuses to communicate -- they should solve that problem, instead of creating yet more problems by not only threatening Steve but encouraging him to use fear to lead his own organization. I think Ben's blog entry would be much more aptly titled "an awesome place to leave"...