Episode Details

Your thoughts on the kiss-cam episode

Andrew Ross Sorkin’s note yesterday about Andy Byron, the C.E.O. of a tech start-up caught on camera with a colleague from H.R. at a Coldplay concert, struck a nerve with DealBook readers, who have flooded our inbox with responses: “The moment seems to encapsulate the pervasive schadenfreude within our culture, especially our office culture, and a deep-seated animosity toward bosses and colleagues,” Andrew wrote. “It highlights a zero-sum mentality in which a colleague’s success is perceived as your loss, and their failure your gain.” He added that, “The incident also underscores our surveillance state.”

Here’s what readers had to say:

“The surveillance state is a bit aggressive of a take on this. They were lovingly embracing at a concert during a love song while the kiss cam was on the prowl.” — Bob McMurtry

“The public is not just reacting to someone else’s misfortune, it is reacting to the utter hypocrisy revealed yet again by those in power who dictate rules that others should follow, yet arrogantly disregard following them themselves. Employees endure hours of H.R. training on the impropriety of workplace relationships, especially between manager and subordinate, yet the actual HEAD of H.R. engages in an affair with her married C.E.O. Do you not see the specific irony of this outing?” — Jim Woidat

“I don’t think we commoners’ resentment of C.E.O.s is so much about jealousy as it is about pay inequality (their pay rate today vs. what it was a few decades ago) and stuff like golden parachutes.” — Tom Eshbaugh

What nobody is talking about:

Before the kisscam: 12 executives (11 men and Chief People Officer Kristin Cabot); 6 directors (all men)

They’ve also disabled their LinkedIn links and yet

Astronomer board launches investigation after viral Coldplay 'kiss cam' video appears to show CEO embracing HR chief

DealBook Hot Take: Board members should be licensed

Jonathan Foster, a consultant and former managing director at Lazard, has served on more than 50 corporate boards. Along the way, he says, he has encountered directors who have stayed too long, or ones whose “knowledge of financial statements and M&A is lacking.” He drew on that experience in “On Board: The Modern Playbook for Corporate Governance,” his new book.

One of his big ideas for improving director performance: “a license,” he told DealBook, like the kind required “for investment bankers, doctors, lawyers, even massage therapists.”

That, he said, “might increase confidence in corporate directors.”