Did Telstra sack a blogger for being too honest?

Link: News.com.au News Blog.

another of Telstra’s public relations faces –its corporate blog - is looking a little bruised.  One of the posters to Now We Are Talking, Tom Reynolds, has been sacked, two days after he wrote a post calling for more open communication from the company to its customers.  Reynolds was working as a case manager with the customer relations team at the time.

“Sometimes departments here have allowed a culture of ‘duck and cover’ to rule them,” he wrote.  “There will need to be more than just a ... series of cool new ads.  We need to look at what we rate as important and make it happen.”

He had pledged to be more responsive to customer complaints and hinted he would try to shake up the corporate bigwigs to provide some answers to recurrent problems.  “Tell me about our ‘endemic’ problems and I’ll go and twist an arm or two and get an answer,” he pledged.  “I’ll start hopping into each issue raised here on this blog and then, as promised, ask those in the know what we’re doing to fix said situations.”

Telstra has “categorically denied” that Reynolds was shown the door over the post.  Nevertheless, at least one blog watcher has said the case shows the tensions within the company over how it engages with customers via blogs.

Read more at Cameron Reilly's blog and here is a link to Tom Reynolds' personal blog.