Case for corruption: abolition of value

Ruined the entity of Elo Touch Solutions

Abusive/foul mouthed CEO
At Elo CEO, Craig Witsoe, gets away shouting “move your asses” or, even worse, “Elo Hazing” in All hands meeting (November 2015). Apparently Craig isn’t the only one. The entire team of so-called “leadership team” loves to use slang and feels elated using abusive languages, even with the external trading partners. Corbett Wood, the “CIO”, abruptly stated “bull-shit” in the very first conference he attended during Belgium warehouse move. He didn’t even understand what was being discussed. Later, the representative from the new warehouse (and the new trading partner), called the Logistics Manager in Belgium to discuss the language (surely the usage of words were not quite acceptable in Belgium)

Nepotism

Nepotism: In an organization, when you have VP of Operations and VP of HR from the same family, you can imagine the amount of corruption that will prevail. The Tax Director, Barbara Currie, wasn’t even aware of “use tax” during the SAP go-live in March 2013. The SAP project manager had to explain the concept to her. AP/Shared Services Manager, Demetria Cheatham, cant detail out the procure to pay process. There were numerous occasions, where SAP Project Manager based out of Milpitas, CA had to re-explain the entire process of invoice posting against purchasing documents. This would raise concern on the background of the person hired for the job.

 

Corruption

Hiring of contractors by Akash Verma to get kickbacks was quite aptly pointed out by the SAP Project Manager. Back in December 2015, security consultant, Adithya Goka, messed up allocations for entire finance approvers resulting in operations at quarter end close (Adithya Goka used to charge $140/hr). Another Finance consultant, Kumar Thiagarajan, was hired by Akash Verma at $135/hr. Kumar was expert in searching for answers on internet. He would claim a solution even when the solution wont even exist outside of some search results using internet search (Google, you are great). Worse still, SAP Project Manager based out of Milpitas CA, warned Akash of a serious flaw in implementation done by JK Technologies team. Akash choose to ignore and at one point in time, there was a logistics lockout to the tune of more than $6 million (4th through 9th February 2016). Unfortunately, the SAP Project Manager was laid-off. It is well known that Akash Verma was protecting the kickbacks and could not risk the SAP project manager who would be able to expose the level of corruption in at Elo.