Shane O'Riordain
Shane O'Riordain, General Manager Group Communications at HBOS, responsible for the development, implementation and delivery of the HBoS reputation management strategy, including corporate responsibility and the HBOS Foundation. In addition to his day-to-day management duties, O'Riordain is usually the public face of the corporation, particularly when dealing with more controversial media stories, for example:
In 2004, HBOS came under attack for its involvement in the investment of a pornographic magazine, it was O'Riordain who dealt with the media, who was quoted as saying:
- "We recognise this decision may have caused offence and embarrassment. We have to recognise that there are many different points of view among our stakeholders"[1]
In 2006, when HBOS faced criticism for its involvement in the Farepak Christmas club collapse, Riordain was quoted as saying:
- "Our moral obligation, we believe, is to our customers, shareholders and, where appropriate, the wider community. We have more than discharged that obligation"[2]
In 2007, HBOS came underfire for the loss of paper documents containing confidential information on some 13,000 of its mortgage customers have been stolen from an employee's car. Once again it was O'Riordain, as the boss of corporate communications that needed to deal with the media fall-out, and who was quoted as saying that lessons had been learnt from the experience, but nevertheless:
- "It is almost impossible to use the stolen customer information for fraudulent purposes, no customer will lose out in the very unlikely event of fraudulent activity on their account following this incident"[3]
Notes
- ^Dow, J. (2004) Bank of Scotland says sorry over porn deal funding, accessed 11/04/07
- ^Womak, S. (2006) Farepak bank: be more grateful. In Financial Mail on Sunday; London. 12/12/06
- ^finextra.com (2007) Halifax Customer Data Stolen, accessed 11/04/07
