MacJordan

Best wishes for a fast recovery for your daughter. Unfortunately your nephew created unnecessary exposure for you and Table with his careless and immature remarks. Most seasoned employees know not to make these kinds of comments in the workplace even if well-intentioned for just this reason.

I am reaching out to the @X community for advice with the likely risk of sharing TMI. I have been sufficiently upset about the whole matter that I have lost sleep thinking about it and I am hoping that this post will enable me to get this matter off my chest. By way of background, I started a family office called TABLE about 15 years ago and hired a friend who had previously managed a family office, and years earlier, had been my personal accountant. She is someone that I trusted implicitly and consider to be a good person. The office started small, but over the last decade, the number of personnel and the cost of the office grew massively. The growth was entirely on the operational side as the investment team has remained tiny. While my investment portfolio grew substantially, the investments I had made were almost entirely passive and TABLE simply needed to account for them and meet capital calls as they came in. While TABLE purchased additional software and other systems that were supposed to improve productivity, the team kept increasing in size at a rapid rate, and the expenses continued to grow even faster. While I would periodically question the growing expenses and high staff turnover, I stayed uninvolved with the office other than a once-a-year meeting when I briefly reviewed the operations and the financials and determined bonus compensation for the President and the CFO. I spent no time with any of the other employees or the operations. The whole idea behind TABLE was that it would handle everything other than my day job so that I would have more time for my job and my family. Over the last six years, expenses ballooned even further, employee turnover accelerated, and I became concerned that all was not well at TABLE. It was time for me to take a look at what was going on. Nearly four years ago, I recruited my nephew who had recently graduated from Harvard and put him to work at Bremont, a British watchmaker, one of my only active personal investments to figure out the issues at the company and ultimately assist in executing a turnaround. He did a superb job. When he returned from the UK late last year after a few years at Bremont, I asked him to help me figure out what was going on with TABLE. When I explained to TABLE’s president what he would be doing, she became incredibly defensive, which naturally made me more concerned. My nephew went to work by first meeting with each employee to understand their roles at the company and to learn from them what ideas they had on how things could be improved. He got an earful. Our first step in helping to turn around TABLE was a reduction in force including the president and about a third of the team, retaining excellent talent that had been desperate for new leadership. Now here is where I need your advice. All but one of the employees who were terminated acted professionally and were gracious on the way out (excluding the president who had a notice period in her contract, is currently still being paid, and with whom I have not yet had a discussion). The highest compensated terminated employee other than the president, an in-house lawyer (let’s call her Ronda), told us that three months of severance was not enough and demanded two years’ severance despite having worked at the company for only two and one half years. When I learned of Ronda's request for severance, I offered to speak with her to understand what she was thinking, but she refused to do so. A few days ago, we received a threatening letter from a Silicon Valley law firm. In the letter, Ronda’s counsel suggests that her termination is part of longstanding issues of ‘harassment and gender discrimination’ – an interesting claim in light of the fact that Ronda was in charge of workplace compliance – and that her termination was due to: “unlawful, retaliatory, and harmful conduct directed towards her. Both [Ronda] and I [Ronda’s lawyer] have spoken with you about [Ronda’s] view of what a reasonable resolution would include given the circumstances. Thus far, TABLE has refused to provide any substantive response. This letter provides the last opportunity to reach a satisfactory agreement. If we cannot do so, [Ronda] will seek all appropriate relief in a court of competent jurisdiction.” The letter goes on to explain the basis for the “unsafe work environment” claim at TABLE: “In early 2026, Pershing Square’s founder Bill Ackman installed his nephew in an unidentified role at TABLE, Ackman’s family office. [His nephew]—whose only work experience had been for TABLE where he was seconded abroad for the last four years to a UK watch company held by Ackman—began appearing at TABLE’s offices and conducting interviews of employees without a clear explanation of his role or the purposes of these interviews. During this period, he made a series of inappropriate and genderbased [sic] comments to multiple employees that created an unsafe work environment. Among other things, [his nephew] made remarks about female employees’ ages (“Tell me you are nowhere near 40”), physical appearance (“Your body does not look like you have kids”), as well as intrusive questions about family planning and sexual orientation (“Who carried your son? Who will carry your next child?”). These incidents were reported to senior leadership at TABLE and Pershing Square. Rather than being addressed appropriately, the response from senior management reflected, at best, willful blindness to the inappropriateness of [his nephew]’s remarks and, at worst, tacit endorsement.” The above allegations about my nephew had previously been brought to my attention by TABLE’s president when they occurred. When I learned of them, I told the president that I would speak to him directly and encouraged her to arrange for him to get workplace sensitivity training. The president assured me that she would do so. When I spoke to my nephew, he explained what he actually had said and how his actual remarks had been received, not at all as alleged in the legal letter from Ronda’s counsel. I have also spoken to others at the lunch table who confirmed his description of the facts. In any case, he meant no harm, was simply trying to build rapport with other employees, and no one, as far as I understand, was offended. Ironically, Ronda claims in her legal letter that TABLE didn’t take HR compliance seriously, yet Ronda was in charge of HR compliance at TABLE and the person who gave my nephew his workplace sensitivity training after the alleged incidents. In any case, Ronda, as head of compliance, should have kept a record or raised an alarm if indeed there was pervasive harassment or other such problems at the company, and there is no evidence whatsoever that this is true. So why does Ronda believe she can get me to pay her nearly $2 million, i.e., two years of severance, nearly one year of severance for each of her years at the company? Well, here is where some more background would be helpful. Over the last two months, I have been consumed with a major family medical issue – one of my older daughters had a massive brain hemorrhage on February 5th and has since been making progress on her recovery – and I am in the midst of a major transaction for my company which I am executing from a hospital room office next to her . While the latter business matter is publicly known, the details of my daughter’s situation are only known to Ronda because of her role at our family office. Now, let’s get back to the subject at hand. Unfortunately, while New York and many other states have employment-at-will, there has emerged an industry of lawyers who make a living from bringing fake gender, race, LGBTQ and other discrimination employment claims in order to extract larger severance payments for terminated employees, and it needs to stop. The fake claim system succeeds because it costs little to have a lawyer send a threatening letter and nearly all of the lawyers in this field work on contingency so there is no or minimal cash cost to bring a claim. And inevitably, nearly 100% of these claims are settled because the public relations and legal costs of defending them exceed the dollar cost of the settlement. The claims are nearly always settled with a confidentiality agreement where the employee who asserts the fake claims remains anonymous and as a result, there is no reputational cost to bringing false claims. The consequences of this sleazy system (let’s call it ‘the System’) are the increased costs of doing business which is a tax on the economy and society. There are other more serious problems due to the System. Unfortunately, the existence of an industry of plaintiff firms and terminated employees willing to make these claims makes it riskier for companies to hire employees from a protected class, i.e., LGBTQ, seniors, women, people of color etc. because it is that much more reputationally damaging and expensive to be accused of racism, sexism, and/or intolerance for sexual diversity than for firing a white male as juries generally have less sympathy for white males. The System therefore increases the risk of discrimination rather than reducing it, and the people bringing these fake claims are thereby causing enormous harm to the other members of these protected classes. So what happened here? Ronda was vastly overpaid and overqualified for the job that she did at TABLE. She was paid $1.05 million plus benefits last year for her work which was largely comprised of filling out subscription agreements and overseeing an outside law firm on closing passive investments in funds and in private and venture stage companies, some compliance work, and managing the office move from one office to another. She had a very good gig as she was highly paid, only had to go into the office three days a week, and could work from anywhere during the summer. Once my nephew showed up and started to investigate what was going on, she likely concluded that there was a reasonable possibility she would be terminated, as her job was in the too-easy-and-to-good-to-be-true category. The problem was that she was not in a protected class due to her race, age or sexual identity so she had to construct the basis for a claim. While she is female and could in theory bring a gender-based discrimination claim, she reported to the president who is female and to whom she is very close, which makes it difficult for her to bring a harassment claim against her former boss. When my nephew complimented a TABLE employee at lunch about how young she looked – in response to saying she was going to her 40-year-old sister’s birthday party, he said ‘she must be your older sister’ – Ronda immediately reported it to our external HR lawyer. She thereby began building her case. The other problem for Ronda bringing a claim is that she was terminated alongside 30% of other TABLE employees as part of a restructuring so it is very difficult for her to say that she was targeted in her termination or was retaliated against. TABLE is now hiring an external fractional general counsel as that is all the company needs to process the relatively limited amount of legal work we do internally. In short, Ronda was eminently qualified and capable and did her job. She was just too much horsepower for what is largely an administrative legal role so she had to come up with something else to bring a claim. Now Ronda knew I was a good target and it was a good time to bring a claim against me. She also knew that I was under a lot of pressure because on March 4th when Ronda was terminated, my daughter had not yet emerged from consciousness, she was not yet breathing on her own, and my daughter and we were fighting for her life. I was and remain deeply engaged in her recovery while at the same time I was working on finishing the closing for the private placement round for my upcoming IPO. Ronda also knew that publicity about supposed gender discrimination and a “hostile and unsafe work environment” are not things that a CEO of a company about to go public wants to have released into the media. And she may have thought that the nearly $2 million she was asking for would be considered small in the context of the reputational damage a lawsuit could cause, regardless of the fact that two years of severance was an absurd amount for an employee who had only worked at TABLE for 30 months. She also likely considered that I wouldn’t want to embarrass my nephew by dragging him into the klieg lights when her claims emerged publicly. So, in summary, game theory would say that I would certainly settle this case, for why would I risk negative publicity at a time when I was preparing our company to go public and also risk embarrassing my nephew. Notably, she hired a Silicon Valley law firm, rather than a typical NY employment firm. This struck me as interesting as her husband works for one of the most prominent Silicon Valley venture firms whose CEO, I am sure, has no tolerance for these kinds of fake claims that sadly many venture-backed companies also have to deal with. I mention this as I suspect her husband likely has been working with her on the strategy for squeezing me as, in addition to being a computer scientist, he is a game theorist. My only advice for him is to understand more about your opponent before you launch your first move. All of the above said, gender, race, LGBTQ and other such discrimination is a real thing. Many people have been harmed and deserve compensation for this discrimination, and these companies and individuals should be punished for engaging in such behavior. Which brings me to the advice I am seeking from the X community. I am not planning to follow the typical path and settle this ‘claim.’ Rather, I am going to fight this nonsense to the end of the earth in the hope that it inspires other CEOs to do the same so we shut down this despicable behavior that is a large tax on society, employment, and the economy and contributes to workplace discrimination rather than reducing it. Do you agree or disagree that this is the right approach?

@patlenehan14 That should go right to the Smithsonian.

My favorite image from last night

@MassDailyNews I'm so embarrassed to live here sometimes.

LIVE: A MASSIVE crowd is flooding Boston Common for today’s ‘No Kings’ rally, with protesters packing the park. Buses are reportedly coming from across Massachusetts — and even from out of state — as the demonstration rapidly swells into a major gathering downtown.

@NJbcFan Great point. They are just not available to purchase via website. Be better BC.

Are there really no seats available countryside or do you have to donate and call. If that's the case, they really should mention it. If it is sold out, did they dress as seats every game?

@BOSthrowback Feels like 100 years ago.

The cover of Spors Illustrated 20 years ago today

@FightMA01003 Both programs need to vastly improve to turn this back into a real rivalry.

As long as Murray isn't interested in preventing UMass and BC from playing every year that's all that matters. Good luck to him

@pinoslover69 Hurley has been so classy that I almost feel bad for all the terrible things I have said, written and thought about UCONN for the last 30 years.

Tonight, we’re all Huskies. Would you rather have reigning Sweet 16 assistant taking over or defending national champion Luke Murray. Yes, that’s right. We made it to Friday, the haters and losers are furious. Luke “The Nuke” Murray is ours #JustWin

@Conteinhabitant I hope you don't mean the sign on the court. It's already laughably large.

You know what maybe the edgerely family court sponsorship isn’t big enough

@JonnyRoot_ Even this take is disingenuous. The last guy in the bench of an NBA team would DOMINATE the WNBA. A solid high school prospect would score 40 points a game. No slight towards the women this is just a fact.

“If Caitlin Clark could play in the NBA, everybody would applaud it. That would be an incredible thing. But if the last guy on the bench of an NBA team went to a WNBA team and started averaging 40 points, everybody would know that is BS." - Legendary Broadcaster Bob Costas Women’s sports should be female ONLY.

@projomike Agree that move to ACC has been difficult for basketball but otherwise football would be a homeless vagrant so it was and remains the only choice.

Maybe Luke’s biggest achievement would be returning BC to the Big East. The ACC has been a terrible fit, particularly in New England’s pro-oriented Hub where the Sox, Pats, Celtics & Bruins dominate.

@Mr_Husky1 Cajun (not Asian) pears. And my personal favorite "3 stripes you're out at the old ball game!".

Admit it: Your kid mispronounced a word three years ago and now the whole family says it that way. What's the word in your house? (We still say 'pasketti' and I’m not stopping anytime soon.)

@bcatleagle Very true. It all went downhill after the embarrassing response to Jags exploring well deserved options.

There were some that worried Murray will only use BC as a stepping stone. To that I say great. To go somewhere else he will need to win and if he wins it will make the job more desirable. Fans need to stop asking BC employees to take a blood oath.

@BCMBB Given the well deserved enthusiasm for this hire it shows how it was administrative malpractice to not have moved on from Earl Grant sooner. We wasted 5 years when people would be excited about BC basketball if they had confidence in the head coach and direction of the program.

Boston College Names Luke Murray To Lead Men's Basketball 🦅 Full Release: bit.ly/4bCCZyo

@arlenparsa And Boston University will never live that down.

AOC graduated with honors from Boston University with double degrees in Economics and International Relations. Markwayne was the only Senator without even a bachelor’s degree. Hope that helps.

@Russ_Steinberg I don't know what kind of voodoo they are doing in Storrs but there is no reason UConn should be a blue blood and this madness will end at some point. Hurley knows this.

It’s always fun to search Dan Hurley’s name when a blueblood job opens like he doesn’t have one already that he’s the perfect fit for

@ksorbs @elonmusk How there is any sane hard working patriotic American left in Chicago is beyond me.

Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson: “We cannot put people in jail anymore. It’s racist.” I can't believe this is real

@mike_gualtieri @CoachLukeMurray @BCMBB @UConnMBB @celtics I will focus on BC basketball so there's that pressure.

I really think @CoachLukeMurray would love coaching @BCMBB He can focus on X and Os and just winning 🏀 games. He does not need to do much off the court activities and can blend into Boston. @UConnMBB is the pro team in CT. With BC, fans will focus on the @celtics in April and the @RedSox all summer. Throw in the @Patriots in the Fall, @BCMBB could dominate Jan to March but not a 12 month pressure cooker. #JustWin

@WhoDeyLEX J Donald is rolling in his grave (if he's dead).

No one in a position of influence at BC has the spine to stand up to Leahy.

@NYCMayor ICE can go anywhere needed to perform its mission. You have no say over federal agents so sit this one out.

ICE doesn’t belong at our airports. Our Office of Immigrant Affairs has updated guidance and you can call their legal hotline at 800-354-0365.

@Johnubacon I don't understand the 5th tier city locations either. Aren't there better options?

The NCAA men's hockey tournament leadership continues to prove itself to be one of the dumbest ever assembled. No campus rinks, far-flung sites where locals are indifferent, and brackets like this. Don't ever change, NCAA!