Exec at Natixis John Hailer Chats About Lazy Rivals

John Hailer, a senior executive at Natixis, was recently interviewed by Yahoo Finance. In the interview, he was asked what other companies were doing wrong that their competitors weren’t. Exec at Natixis John Hailer said “It’s not just about the financials and it’s not just about strategy; it is also a matter of culture.” To this end, he noted that while they are lazy to a degree, there is often little they can do as most companies won’t even take the time to properly go through deal documents before accepting them.

John Hailer also said that companies are showing a lack of long-term vision with their “short-term mentality” which is why there is such a great deal of M&A activity in the current market. What he meant by this was that company executives would rather give up control of their company and customer relationships than work together as one to tackle the new challenges that the market presents.

Indeed, and what Natixis CEO John Hailer doesn’t touch upon, is the fact that when a company goes public it is required by law to inform shareholders on certain topics such as executive compensation, management team structure (including board appointments) and the like. The SEC regulates disclosure in the public market on these matters and there is nothing quite like being suddenly told you haven’t received a severance package simply because the company’s board decided against making it certain that your job goes to a member of its new management team.

According to the data at Fortune .com, there are over a thousand companies that went public in the past year. Many of these companies have yet to provide a significant update on their financial reporting and on their leadership structure. After all, most companies tend to shy away from releasing news which could turn out negative for it.

In short, the market has grown so large that not even a CEO is safe from the whims of Wall Street traders. The days of long-term vision among company executives are long behind us, and unfortunately there’s not much that external parties can do about it.