Major CEO: Being Outed Ruined My Career
With advanced degrees from Cambridge University, a position as CEO of a major firm, and a seat in the House of Lords (the British equivalent of the Senate), John Browne seemed a man of rare accomplishment. But his life was turned inside out when he was outed, Browne says in his new memoir, Beyond Business.
Lord Browne (as he is now called) had been the chief executive officer of BP (formerly British Petroleum) until he commissioned a report on an industrial accident that rocked the company and culminated in his being forced out. Even that, however, was not Browne’s nadir; that came when Browne was blackmailed by a male lover, leading to an investigation--and perjury on Browne’s part, as he tried to cover up having met the younger man, a Canadian, online. Ejected from the closet, Browne was also propelled that much more quickly from his post at BP, according to a review of his memoir published Feb. 8 in UK newspaper The Guardian.
"As a reminder of the homophobia that persists in corporate (and media) life, the tale takes some beating," writes reviewer Dan Roberts. "There remain few openly gay business leaders in Britain, although as Browne acknowledges, this is partly generational: men who felt it necessary to hide their personal life during less liberal decades understandably see little need to discuss it in public now.
"Yet the focus on this episode during moving interviews in The Times and on Radio Four to promote the book, risks doing exactly what Browne fought so hard against: letting his sexuality eclipse his professional record," Roberts continues. "What feels uncomfortably absent this week is context. Just as we over-simplified his career on the way up, we risk over-glorifying his descent."
In an interview with the BBC, Browne reckons that having been blackmailed certainly taught me that I was vulnerable," adding that the extortion attempt "began to open up the cupboards of the past, full of ghosts."
The BBC interview notes that Browne’s memoir recounts how Browne knew he was gay as a student in the 1960, "when it was illegal," as the interview notes, going on to refer to Browne’s own contention that he would not have fared as well as he did in business had his true sexuality been a matter of public knowledge.
Browne spoke to how times had changed, saying that now, "When I describe the situation to someone much younger than me, they look at me with amazement. but I think they can’t possibly understand the fear that was engendered in people’s hearts about being gay."
Asked "how painful" it had been to keep the truth about himself from being know, Browne told the interviewer, "Very, very much indeed... It is not something I would recommend for anybody in today’s 21st century."
