Beware the angry birds

THE New Yorker magazine ran a cartoon last year of three monkeys in a row: one with a microphone (labelled “hear all evil”), one with a television camera (“see all evil”) and one with a laptop (“post all evil”). Today’s bosses still need to worry about the unwise monkeys of the press. But as big a threat to their careers these days is the risk of being pecked by Twitter’s swarm of angry birds. Thanks to the digital revolution, chief executives now live in glass houses. An ill-judged remark can be broadcast to the world in an instant. An unwise “reply all” can provide sensitive information to a competitor. An exasperated complaint in the midst of a crisis can seal your doom. Tony Hayward, who was boss of BP during the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, never recovered from his plea that “I want my life back”.