Award cutting CEO had just returned from European junket
I blogged yesterday on how the Radio New Zealand CEO Peter Cavanagh informed all his staff that they would not be entering the Radio Awards this year, as the costs of submitting entries is too high for their constrained budget.
Roar Prawn reports that the same CEO has just returned from Amsterdam where he had been attending the International Broadcasters Conference. Rooms at the closest hotel are 310 euros or $630 a night.
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Tags: Peter Cavanagh, Radio NZ
October 1st, 2009 at 6:44 am
An organisation’s CEO attends an international conference of similar organisations. What’s remarkable or reprehensible about that?
Roar Prawn speculates on the total cost of the CEO’s business trip as $25k, while this post speculates that the CEO may have stayed at a hotel costing $630 per night. No real facts reported, least of all anything about the content or importance of the Amsterdam Conference.
And this just a couple of days after recounting Fran O’Sullivan’s cautionary observations about the need for accuracy and fact-checking in political blogs.
[DPF: What is remarkable is that attending the conference is deemed affordable and entering the awards is not. When budgets are tight you prioritise]
October 1st, 2009 at 6:49 am
Ha ha ha!
Love to see the expense account on that one!
1) Flights, Hotel & Meals circa. $25K
Incidentals:
2) In – room “Massage”, depends on the ‘specials’ circa. $1.5K
3) “Coffee” – $100
4) “Cake” – $25
5) “Nightclub” – who knows what his proclivities are so let me be ‘generous’ and say circa. $1K
6) “talcum powder” – gotta keep up with the Joneses, $1k
Grand Total circa. $30K
Wonder what the entry fee to the Radio Media Awards was?
October 1st, 2009 at 7:08 am
I am sure these junkets would be less appealing if the accomodations were staying in the spare room at some NZ diplomat’s house (which should be mandatory), or some backpacker or 2-star hotel.
October 1st, 2009 at 7:19 am
What a wanker, the following link tells what a hypocrite, boot licker this clown is
http://www.radionz.co.nz/media/radio_new_zealand_wins_supreme_award
Yet another bloated public service flunky, the harder you scratch the worse it gets.
October 1st, 2009 at 7:34 am
Conferences are right up there with strategic planning seminars as the epitome of “no-business” business activities.
The only people who financially benefit from conferences are event organising firms and 100 buck whores.
October 1st, 2009 at 7:58 am
Well obviously RadioNZ arent really serious about reducing costs – they are just trying to frighten people to spend less. When organisations waste money like this – then one always knows that it just bullshit.
As they say – the only real excuse to actually doing work is to attend a meeting………..
October 1st, 2009 at 9:43 am
Ah yes – meetings – the practical alternative to working. You know those organisations that have people who are in meetings all the time. You know they actually do sweet fuck all. My working life is down to one or two a week now. Thank God.
October 1st, 2009 at 12:16 pm
Fewer junkets, more Plunket
Fewer travel bills, more Kim Hill
Less high-flyin’, more Kathryn Ryan
October 1st, 2009 at 12:35 pm
(Will de Cleene, inter alia, blogged: ‘Fewer travel bills, More Kim Hill’)
No!! Not more Kim Hill! Puh-lease!!
October 1st, 2009 at 5:11 pm
[DPF: What is remarkable is that attending the conference is deemed affordable and entering the awards is not. When budgets are tight you prioritise]
Thanks for that homily. I agree. Maybe they did prioritise. I’ve got no idea without knowing the content and value of the conference. Nor do you, with respect. I can make some judgement (purely as a consumer) about the value of the radio awards; I tend to see them as ego trips shared around annually – possibly based on what the participants pay for all I know. Yet what if the conference produced a partnership from which RNZ obtained valuable programme feed or technology at a fraction of its real cost? And was the conference the only (or the major) work undertaken the trip?
My principal objection to the tall poppy bashing going on here relates to the “costs” being ascribed to the CEO’s participation. $25k and $630 per night hotel costs are being bandied around somewhat recklessly don’t you think? And what would have been the total costs of RNZ’s awards participation? Information obtained under an OIA might have provided a more reasonable basis for comparison, or for a judgment on the amount of prioritisation involved – if any.