World Intellectual Property Office settles dispute with CIO it previously ousted for 'criminal misconduct'

The World Intellectual Property Office (WIPO) has settled a dispute with former CIO Wei Lei whose employment was terminated under "irregular" circumstances after he blew the whistle on its former director general's alleged dodgy procurement. Lei was dismissed by the governing patent body in February 2019 following an internal …

[Yet Another Anonymous coward]

amicably resolved before the aforementioned process could be concluded,

Lift shaft, door error and power failure

or wheely chair, stairwell, roll of carpet and shovel ?

[Nunyabiznes]

Way Laid

Wei Lei appears to be the bigger person in this charade. Hats off to him and I hope his retirement is golden.

[Keven E]

Re: Way Laid

...he is looking for "non-gainful opportunities" to use his "skills and spare time".

All the best. *Personal gain, perhaps.

[NoneSuch]

Crap rolls down hill.

Had my manager once tell our VP that a $350,000 project would not work if implemented as it was. It needed changes in the $50-80K range to do what the VP promised. VP overrode the manager as it would set back the promised date the VP had given the CEO / board of directors.

Fast forward three months, project goes live and bombs. Now that the project was live, the costs to fix it doubled. Manager was blamed and subsequently fired. VP was promoted to Exec-VP and is still with the company last I heard.

[anothercynic]

Re: Crap rolls down hill.

ALWAYS get things in writing. And when the other person resists putting it in writing, write back confirming that said person resisted putting it in writing and that this should be a matter of record.

[veti]

Re: Crap rolls down hill.

I agree, but the hard part is knowing when to do this.

Too light a trigger, and you'll be labelled negative, alarmist, not a team player and generally career dead. Too heavy, and you won't have the right paper trail when you need it.

[Down not across]

Re: Crap rolls down hill.

Easiest way around is just always ask for things in writing. Doesn't have to sound like CYA, just something like "Could you just drop it in an email so I have all the facts in one place" or something.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Crap rolls down hill.

Oh yes.

Many years ago, I found that a proposed customer project of over £8M would never deliver, so being a (mostly) ethical sort of chap I opened my mouth. The problem was, of course, that various people in my organisation were already buying cars and whatnot from their forthcoming slice of this project. The problem: now I had stated this, it was part of record.

First they tried to get me in front of the most senior guy they could find who absolutely hated consultants and present this to him. That backfired dramatically because instead of hating me I was complimented for the way in which I presented issues and consequences (the man had a military background and so shared my dislike of BS and consulting waffle) and I was to be praised for picking this up. So, that £8M project was annulled.

So, next they stuck me on a dead end project which was destined to fail so they could push me into what is euphemistically called "performance improvement process", aka death row. The idea is that you go round the company asking to be taken into projects, but, of course, you have the Mark Of Death because you need to get "improvement feedback" so that doesn't happen. The idea is to make you resign rather than them making you redundant as that saves them a good three months of wages (the customer praise of the previous project made it rather hard to claim performance issues).

I had about a week of this before I decided to wield the axe, also because I was given a manager who would not be able to wipe his rear end without instructions in cartoon form. I gave HR bluntly a choice of either redundancy or face constructive dismissal proceedings (which would bar them from government work).

They caved, but still left me with an unpaid phone bill in expenses which resulted from digging them out of a lot of crap because they shipped infected gear to pharmacies, they claimed that it was all personal calls and at the time I had other things to do so I left it.

I'm now screening consultancies to pick up some of our work as we have more than we can handle.

Guess who isn't invited?

[Anonymous Coward]

Whistleblowers are an endangered species

They always have been and they always will be. Unfortunately, whether it's a government or corporate hierarchy, the accused has all the power and retaliation is hard to prove.

I applaud Mr. Lei for persevering and wish him well in his future endeavors.

[Denarius]

as usual

only a courageous determined whistleblower can maybe, get justice. In Oz the powers that be have a great whistleblower protection laws, as useful as used toilet paper. Kudos Mr Lei. Now about management that let it go that far.... As usual, untouched

[nowster]

WIPOut!

[xyz123]

How is WIPO even still a thing?

They were sending electronics and all sorts of goods to North Korea, even to ISIS during sanctions.

They openly and blatantly support Boko Haram with necessary supplies. They violation US sanctions, UN Sanctions etc without a care.

Why they haven't been 100% shut down and listed as a terrorist supporting organization is beyond me.