It’s been a while since we featured a tool of the week – someone who elevates bad to a whole new level – but with the rash of bad behavior plaguing us lately, we feel its high time. Problem is, we couldn’t narrow it down to one, so here are three of the tools who surfaced this week…

Fergie, Fergie, Fergie, what in the name of the queen were you thinking trying to sell out ole Andrew like that? I mean I know you only got $22K a year in the divorce agreement, but you were a princess for goodness sake? A princess! You couldn’t have turned that into something lucrative for a lifetime? Shame on you Ferg – save the apology for your husband and your children. Read about Fergie’s disastrous decisions here. (Image Source Reuters)

The woman who sued her cell phone company for outing her affair. We collectively hope she’s thrown out of court. Granted, the phone company erred by sending her phone bill to their house in his name, but I’m thinking the affair is what caused him to leave you, not the phone bill you racked up.

The talking heads and finger pointers at BP, Haliburton and Transocean will actually get the tool award this week for bickering back and forth about whose fault the gulf coast disaster is and who should be responsible for damages. Read more about the blame game here.

Back when we had the time to cover much of the mayhem going on with our fine elected officials, infamous sex-ter and former Detroit mayor Kwame Kilpatrick was one of our faves. Why? Because he made it so easy.

First he cheated, then he lied about cheating, then he lied about lying. Then he got busted through the release of a series of explicit text messages sent to the very chief of staff he’d sworn he wasn’t having an affair with.

Well yesterday Kilpatrick learned that he was going to prison for up to five years for violating the terms of his probation stemming from his conviction for lying under oath. As part of the probation agreement, Kilpatrick had been ordered to pay the city $1 million. Judge David Groner ruled last month that Kilpatrick failed to report all of his assets. In court Tuesday, the judge admonished Kilpatrick saying, “Your continued attempt to cast yourself as the victim, your lack of forthrightness, your lack of contriteness and lack of humility … clearly rehabilitation has failed.”

Kilpatrick pled his case, citing “confusion” over the written orders he’d been given as his reason for not adhering to them. The judge wasn’t buying it, and neither are we. If the former mayor of Detroit didn’t understand the terms of his probation, couldn’t he have just sent someone a text? Kwame, tell your story walking…straight into your prison cell.

Source: Associated Press

As the finger pointing and blame game continue between the companies involved in the most recent “unnatural” disaster, the gulf coast’s waters are now strewn with toxic oil.  At the same time, despite company protests to the contrary, the coal mining tragedy that took place in April might have been avoided if Massey Energy management hadn’t ignored and/or intimidated workers who had serious concerns about their working environment.

Gary Quarles, whose 29 year old son was killed in the coal mine explosion, testified before the U.S. House Education and Labor Committee yesterday that Massey routinely sent out radio alerts that a “man is on the property” whenever inspectors would arrive.  Other miners claim that Massey was a “ticking time bomb” where workers feared for their lives but also feared that voicing their concerns over growing safety issues would cost them their jobs. Workers went on to describe a culture where production was priority and where safety took a back seat.

The result – 29 miners died in the worst U.S. coal mining disaster since 1970 leaving dozens of grieving family and friends.  With the gulf disaster, when you take into account the lives lost, the ecological disaster and the damage that will be done to the gulf’s fishing and tourism industry, the fallout is unfathomable.

Even in the face of the mining tragedy, Massey Energy chief executive Don Blankenship told U.S. senators that Massey “does not place profits over safety.” How can he say that with a straight face in light of what we all now know about the way Massey Energy was run? You know how?  Because despite all the business school talk, mandatory management training classes and annual management reviews, a lot of what passes for management today is unforgivably awful.

Bad boss rants and websites are kind of a joke on the web, especially among people who’ve been fortunate enough never to have had one.  But the crisis of mismanagement that’s prevalent in business today has far reaching consequences. Consequences that go beyond hurt feelings, low employee morale and simply having a bad day at work. When workers are more afraid of getting on the wrong side of management than they are about their own lives, then we’ve gone beyond bad. Maybe irreparably so.

Source: Sunday Gazette

We typically focus on bad bosses in the workplace, but this story proved too hard to resist. At Really Bad Boss, we define a boss as anyone who has control over anything at anytime. Technically we’re all bosses of something, whether its our lives, our kid’s lives (for a little while anyway) or our relationships. The point is, you’re the one managing it and you’re responsible for the decisions and choices you make. Unless of course, you’re a really bad wife, then it’s the phone company’s fault

Gabriella Nagy, a native of Toronto, Canada, is suing her wireless company, Rogers Wireless Inc., to the tune of $600,000, after she claims they sent her cell phone bill to her husband. It probably wouldn’t have been a big deal except Mrs. Nagy had been carrying on an affair with someone other than Mr. Nagy and when Mr. Nagy noticed that Mrs. Nagy’s cell phone bill contained several calls to the same number, he put two and two together.

Nagy claims she’d requested the cell phone company send the bill in her name, but they instead bundled it along with the couple’s television, Internet and home phone bill – all in her husband’s name.  Her husband left her and their children when he called the mystery phone number and the man on the other end confirmed he’d recently had a three-week affair with Mrs. Nagy.

Nagy’s attorney says the lawsuit is the first of its kind. I for one hope it’s the last, and that the case and the former Mrs. Nagy both get thrown out of court.

Source: Weekly World News

What the Blogosphere’s saying about bad bosses this week…

Over at the Non-working monkey, the non-working monkey himself has a “strong desire to do very little (unless it’s something you really like doing) and be answerable to no-one, whilst understanding that working is necessary in order to get money, which we need to live.” One of the things he does well is create cute little movies, with cute little characters acting out skits about really bad bosses. You can check them out here.

eBossWatch is reporting that Jackie Chan’s former assistant says Mr. Chan and his wife Joan Lin are really bad bosses.

On Bullies Be Gone, Ben Leichtling provides some tips on stopping bullies at work, specifically the control freaks.

The New York Times blog reviews workplace reviews – you know those horrible things we’re forced to undergo quarterly or annually that are often meaningless? Well we’re not the only ones who think so.

Almost six months ago I posted a story about Haley Tansey. Tansey was the Halifax, UK HBOS worker who last year filed a sexual harassment claim against her former employer citing repeated sexual harassment from as far back as 1998. In one incident, Tansey claimed she awoke in her hotel room one night to find a male colleague sitting in a chair in the corner. The colleague then went into the bathroom and emerged a short time later – completely naked.

This week the employment tribunal reviewing Tansey’s case accepted her version of events, but ruled that she should have spoken up sooner. Tansey didn’t complain until August 2007 – the time limit for reporting sexual harassment claims is three months after each incident. The tribunal stated, “Although the tribunal understood that it is difficult for a woman who has been subjected to sexual harassment to make a complaint, it was satisfied in this case that Mrs Tansey’s reasons for delaying so long before taking action were not such that it was just and equitable to extend time.”

Damian McCarthy, representing HBOS, told the tribunal: “This is not a claimant who is a cowering wallflower.” He added, “It’s a claimant who did not actually believe these were acts of sexual harassment at the time.” Tansey is considering appealing the ruling.

Read the full story here.

While his state faces an $11 billion budget shortfall, Texas Gov. Rick Perry lives in a massive rental home that, to date, has cost $600,000 to rent and maintain. The 6,386-square-foot rental home in the hills, where Perry resides while the Governor’s mansion is under repair, costs $10,000 a month to rent. Other expenses to maintain the governor’s house-on-the-hill rental lifestyle include:

• $18,000 for household supplies and cleaning products
• Over $1,000 in window coverings
• A $700 clothes rack
• Grounds and lawn maintenance $44,000
• Heated pool maintenance $8,400

This spending comes at a time when Perry has asked state agencies to reduce their budgets by 5 percent.

In fairness to Perry, his staff claims he has cut back on luxuries and now has only one housekeeper and one and half (part-time) chef. They also go onto explain blah blah blah blah… If you care to read why yet another politician is overspending on luxuries while his constituents beg for unemployment extensions, click here.