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Veinticinco

macrumors 65816
Feb 25, 2009
1,469
1,428
Europe
A brief skid mark in the underpants of Apple's history. Rejected for fit rather than competency? Yeah you keep telling yourself that Browett, you proved in record time to be the one-man walking disaster many people had you down for.

Nothing personal but I'd experience a unhealthy amount of schadenfreude if Monsoon/Accessorize went bust in the next 6 months (not that unlikely either) simply for the fact it may signal the death knell for this retail charlatan's career. Harsh? The man never needs to work again thanks to the obscene $3m reward for incompetence that Apple shoved into his back pocket before shuffling him along the gang-plank.
 

PinkyMacGodess

Suspended
Mar 7, 2007
10,271
6,226
Midwest America.
This is by far the most worrying question mark over Cook's aptitude.

Ahh, but remember that Steve Jobs chose Tim Cook as his successor... And he picked John Sculley too...

The hardest and most disastrous choice is a successor... It's perhaps too early to tell, but there are troubling signs that perhaps Mr. Cook wasn't the 'best choice' for the job.

Time will tell...
 

class77

macrumors 6502a
Nov 16, 2010
831
92
Poor old Browett. Apple forced him to take MILLIONS off their hands before they fired him.....:D
 

ipedro

macrumors 603
Nov 30, 2004
6,207
8,425
Toronto, ON
Honestly? You can do better than that... Because you've noticed that one underpowered macbook is running final cut you're concluding that apple stores arent a beacon of innovative costumer service? Listen to yourself.. It made me cringe.

That was one example. And it's a critical mistake as much as you don't believe it and as much as I make you cringe.

A potential customer walks into an Apple store, clicks open FCP and the thing just stalls there for minutes. I did it next to an Apple employee who was clearly embarrassed. We had force quit FCP and then just moved on to a more powerful iMac. What message does that send a new user? That either FCP is not going to run on their computer or that Macs in general are slow. Apple Stores are set up as a place to experience Apple. If your first Apple experience is like that one, you're not going to come out impressed.

The solution is simple: different install images for different hardware. Don't install FCP on a MacbookAir for example. Use the iMac's and the lone Mac Pro in the store for that. This isn't a local store's error, it's coming from the top. Right now, there is nobody at the top.

Apple has always been about thinking through the details and their retail reflected that. With its growing popularity, Apple has failed to keep up. They've lowered their hiring expectations and failed to adjust the details to new realities.

If you want more examples...

Untrained Apple employees are now the norm. It used to be that you could walk into an Apple store and get an answer about any of Apple's apps or hardware products. I've recently been looking for solutions for a photography and video setup. I've spent upwards of $10K on this project. From RAID drives to control peripherals for Aperture and Final Cut. Each time that I've genuinely needed help from a specialist, I have not gotten any good answers. Nobody seems to know anything about Aperture (I've been to 4 different Apple stores while shopping around for solutions) and when I inquired about RAID, I had 3 employees around me trying to figure out how the LaCie 2Big drive worked, all of them basically reading the box or searching online. When I needed to know if a Wacom tablet could give me physical shuttle control for FCP or whether it would work in Aperture, nobody knew anything about Wacom tablets. This is not the Apple Store I remember from 4 or 5 years ago when I was setting up my previous work station.

It wasn't always like this. There's a reason why the Apple Store has become a model in retail. There's also a reason why Browett was fired. Ideally Ron Johnson would just come back (I'm hopeful) but Tim Cook needs to do something real quick because he's neglecting retail and that was one of the pillars set up by Steve Jobs that has lead to Apple's rise to prominence in the mainstream and its recent success. As such, it could also be its downfall.
 

everything-i

macrumors 6502a
Jun 20, 2012
827
2
London, UK
Too bad that Apple doesn't take advice from the macrumors forum posters ... On almost every thread there is tons of advice of what Apple should or shouldn't do. Apple could save the failing business when they would listen to all the experts that give here advice for free.

While I would agree for the most part that MR forums are full of posts from arm chair CEOs in this case it was obvious to us in the UK that this guy was not a good fit for running Apple's retail business. Personally I could not believe what I was reading when the news broke that he had been hired in that role.
 

dysamoria

macrumors 68020
Dec 8, 2011
2,243
1,865
Poor old Browett. Apple forced him to take MILLIONS off their hands before they fired him.....:D

And somehow society tolerates this. Even getting laid off, regular people get crap for severance. They'll work a lot harder to make you leave on your own (including outright abuse) so they don't have legal requirement to give you anything. They really don't like firing much outright because of legal crap so they just make it all the more pushy and manipulating.

But if you're a lousy CEO, like at HP, they pay you disgusting amounts when getting rid of you, even if you've ruined the company (HP again, or like in Browett's case, damaged the company's reputation).

At peon level, it's all the abuse they can dish, and frequently punishment for doing good work. At executive level, it's a cushy retirement fund as reward for failure.

Society tolerates this because it's run by these kinds of people and the actual majority have no affect on their government or law.
 

constantsnags!

macrumors regular
Apr 16, 2008
163
161
Aotearoa
I can tell you that every person who still works at the store I used to work at a few years ago practically screamed with joy when this idiot left the job. He absolutely ruined an awful lot of work Ron did to make Apple about the only semi palatable retail job anywhere. To take someone from an environment as appalling as Dixons showed an unbelievable lack of foresight.
 

tumtumtum

macrumors member
Sep 16, 2012
80
94
Service definitely went down for me

Last July/August my iPhone 4S stopped charging (through no fault of my own - no water damage or cracks or anything). After a 2 week wait for an Apple store appointment the Genius in the store refused to repair/replace it under warranty. I had to pay £140 because they said the "charging" problem was not a standard problem that would be covered under warranty. I've never had service like that from Apple in the past or since. In the end I talked to the manager who also refused. I was pretty pissed off but paid the £140 because I needed a phone.
 

seedster2

macrumors 6502a
Sep 16, 2007
686
0
NYC
It appears that Tim needs some lessons on interviewing. Only qualified people should be asked to interview, and the interviews determine who would fit into the culture and work with people the best. I can't imagine that Browett was the only qualified person available for interviewing.

unless...Tim was well aware of Browett's M.O. and wanted these actions done with a buffer in place to protect Apple from the blowback.

He was let go because the press was all over the story about staff being cut at the Apple stores. Image people is everything.
C'mon y'all you know even when a business is doing good companies will cut staff to maximize profits.
He was doing exactly what Tim told him to do. Period. And when the press got wind of this he was let go. Just like that.

I agree. The poor guy was a pawn. Apple knew they had to make the cuts so they brought this guy into to do it. Then they get rid of him to save face.

I suspect he was hired by Tim Cook to do what Tim Cook knows how to do: Reduce Costs.

I tend to agree with you. I cannot imagine Browett's decisions weren't approved by Cook and others.

Is that the same clown that wanted to cut salaries and staff while Apple turned a killer profit? What a douchebag! That would have made for an even worse GeniusBar experience and employees with a no-can-do attitude. Not to mention, a huge backlash from the news media and customers.

dont be naive. He couldnt have been the only one ok with this decision. Do you think the rest of the executive team were angels?
 

macs4nw

macrumors 601
Rejected for fit rather than competency? Hmm... I start to understand how he managed to get hired in the first place. This man can twist space itself.

A fact that every UK based Mac Rumors reader knew all along and yet somehow Tim Cook managed to miss. :confused:

Unbelievable. Tim, and those who advised him, clearly did not do their homework on this one!
 

righteye

macrumors 6502
Aug 29, 2011
337
47
London
In a quote i saw he said working at Apple was "probably best thing that happened to me".
I dont think the staff saw it quite the same way
 

righteye

macrumors 6502
Aug 29, 2011
337
47
London
Too bad that Apple doesn't take advice from the macrumors forum posters ... On almost every thread there is tons of advice of what Apple should or shouldn't do. Apple could save the failing business when they would listen to all the experts that give here advice for free.

I Hear what you are saying but at the same time one has to smile knowing how opposed many of the members were at the news of his employment and any one having been anywhere near a Dixons store (RIP) could only wonder what was going on at Apple that they felt they needed this Guy.
 

Lankyman

macrumors 68020
May 14, 2011
2,083
832
U.K.
Too bad that Apple doesn't take advice from the macrumors forum posters ... On almost every thread there is tons of advice of what Apple should or shouldn't do. Apple could save the failing business when they would listen to all the experts that give here advice for free.

And were the UK posters right? Come on take a deep breath then a sip of water and say it slowly - oh yes we were. :D
 

alfistas

macrumors regular
Jun 28, 2012
191
0
Helios Prime
And somehow society tolerates this. Even getting laid off, regular people get crap for severance. They'll work a lot harder to make you leave on your own (including outright abuse) so they don't have legal requirement to give you anything. They really don't like firing much outright because of legal crap so they just make it all the more pushy and manipulating.

But if you're a lousy CEO, like at HP, they pay you disgusting amounts when getting rid of you, even if you've ruined the company (HP again, or like in Browett's case, damaged the company's reputation).

At peon level, it's all the abuse they can dish, and frequently punishment for doing good work. At executive level, it's a cushy retirement fund as reward for failure.

Society tolerates this because it's run by these kinds of people and the actual majority have no affect on their government or law.

Exactly! That's pretty much today's employment culture... :eek:
 

AlBDamned

macrumors 68030
Mar 14, 2005
2,641
15
You can see and feel that nobody is heading Apple retail right now.

On limited experience recently I would agree. I was in the Sydney flagship store recently and it was dirty, messy, queues everywhere. The genius I spoke to was really good, but the store experience itself was strangely off. I said as much in the post-appointment/purchase survey (also bought an iPod shuffle replacement at the same time).
 

AidenShaw

macrumors P6
Feb 8, 2003
18,667
4,676
The Peninsula
...(also bought an iPod shuffle replacement at the same time).

Did bells and lights go off because you were the first one to buy an Ipod this year? :)

Seriously though, is it any wonder that Ipod sales are in the toilet? Every other Itoy duplicates the features of an Ipod.
 

Azzin

macrumors 603
Jun 23, 2010
5,425
3,723
London, England.
In a quote i saw he said working at Apple was "probably best thing that happened to me".
I dont think the staff saw it quite the same way

I reckon that "probably best thing that happened to me" was the staff's response, when asked about Browett's firing! :D
 

lucidmedia

macrumors 6502a
Oct 13, 2008
702
37
Wellington, New Zealand
I think Seedster2 nailed it... When making difficult changes it is best to bring someone in with an agreement that they will not be around for a long time... You float in, break some hearts, and leave with your golden parachute. Everyone wins. Apple's senior staff can shift the blame and pretend they were not behind it, and Browett leaves quite a bit wealthier...

unless...Tim was well aware of Browett's M.O. and wanted these actions done with a buffer in place to protect Apple from the blowback.
 
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