'You're Fired?' Trump Must Find His Inner CEO in Security Scandal | Opinion

The supposedly pro-business Trump administration has distressed actual business leaders with its confusing, hostile trade policies and diplomatic flip flops: first favoring our allies and then our adversaries. Financial markets have crashed, consumers are frightened, and deals are paralyzed.

None of this was made better by the revelation of secret, frat-boy-toned exchanges between President Donald Trump's national security team over strikes in Yemen, which included a direct disagreement between the vice president and his boss.

Atlantic editor Jeffrey Goldberg was added to the conversation over the war plans, which took place over the public platform Signal, and has shared the messages with the world. Moreover, the blasé, derogatory, and arrogant commentary about the United States' closest allies in Europe that was part of the exchanges is a major embarrassment to all Americans. And it is sure to be worrying other nations considering sharing intelligence with us.

Most top CEOs believe we are at a tipping point for taking collective action condemning the degradation of America's national security because of Trump's systematic degradation of American's national security.

Goldberg's first-hand account of being accidentally looped into an exchange with national security leaders, and other senior officials, sharing highly sensitive information about the weapons, targets, and timing for an imminent military strike over an unsecure channel shows an unprofessional recklessness that no successful business leaders exhibit.

Vice President JD Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, and National Security Advisor Mike Waltz, along with a dozen others, demonstrated a complete disregard of standard security procedures. Then they denied that this documented gross misconduct before Congress.

Of course, in business, the conduct of the CEO becomes embedded in the culture of the company. Apparently, the same holds true here. In 2022, the National Archives recovered fully 300 highly confidential, classified government documents Trump had spirited away to his Mar-a-Lago resort. They had been left openly stacked by toilets, stashed in closets, and crammed in a pool pump house in a portrayal of arrogant disdain for protocols of American national security.

In an administration that has espoused a philosophy of bringing the best of business to government, the severity of the situation should be well understood—as should the path forward. When dangerous lapses in judgment and privacy breaches occur in the business world, speedy investigations lead to prompt discipline and systemic repairs.

Erroneous "fat-finger" inputs by stock traders that periodically interrupt normal market operations and result in the loss of millions or even billions of dollars draw the investigative ire of not only company leaders but also the Securities and Exchange Commission, Department of Justice, and a potential host of other agencies. Multi-million-dollar fines often follow, as does the possibility of additional regulatory reporting requirements, restricted market privileges, termination of employment, and even imprisonment.

A 2019 study found that CEOs are just as likely to be fired for ethical lapses and unprofessional behavior as for poor financial performance or board struggles. For instance, the talented Uber founder and CEO Travis Kalanick parted ways with the ride-sharing company after a series of scandals emerged in 2017. Decisions like those of Ernst & Young, KPMG, Deloitte, and Google to terminate employees for violating codes of conduct are not uncommon, albeit usually done in private. Similarly, in the legal profession, lawyers who violate state bar codes of conduct are subject to discipline, such as censure, suspension, or loss of license to practice law.

In a January memo to his staff, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerburg threatened to terminate employees who leak company information, specifically calling out the "immediate security impact" in a fiercely competitive environment. After conducting an investigation, Meta fired 20 employees this month for sharing confidential information with outside sources. In 2018, Apple issued a similar memo after firing an employee for leaking private details about unreleased products.

It wouldn't be strange if Trump's employees were investigated and potentially dismissed under similar circumstances if this were the private sector.

In fact, a former senior military official shared with us the traditional process for conducting a threat assessment when classified or highly sensitive information is leaked. It's not too different from the private sector. According to the official, their cell phones should be confiscated and analyzed to determine if additional sensitive information has been put at risk and/or leaked. If other information was mishandled, the risk to the safety of military members, the CIA, other national security staff, and our country should be promptly addressed. A fuller picture of the actions to be taken by senior authorities are as follows:

1. Ensure official secure channels are used always for confidential dangerous exchanges.
2. Don't try to subvert records, documentation, and accountability with casual social media
3. Deny parties access if in non-secure public venues
4. Validate all identities on chat groups
5. Confiscate all devices used to host the sensitive communications
6. Run security analytics to assess whether the device is compromised
7. Restrict any public commentary about confidential details on the topic until cleared
8. Conduct investigative interviews with the relevant parties to understand if other sensitive conversations were held on the same device or if other devices have been used for similar conversations
9. Monitor for possibility of negative secondary effects becoming a reality—implement plans to mitigate damage as necessary
10. Acknowledge breaches, share findings from security analysis and investigative interviews with relevant parties and stakeholders and administer any disciplinary actions

Whether chief executives of a business or federal agency, leaders are expected to exemplify the highest degree of professional performance and conduct. They are selected because their bosses—from boards of directors and shareholders to the president of the United States and Congress—believe they are capable of adhering to that standard. If rules are violated, due process should be followed as called for by federal policy. Otherwise, Trump risks further eroding the public's trust in government.

President Franklin D. Roosevelt spoke of the presidency as something of a higher calling in 1933, saying to a reporter: "The presidency is not merely an administrative office. That's the least of it. It is more than an engineering job, efficient or inefficient. It is pre-eminently a place of moral leadership." This applies to the president's diplomatic and security teams, as well as to business leaders and frat boys who all must be obey the rules that ensure moral leadership.

Jeffrey Sonnenfeld is the founder and president of the Yale Chief Executive Leadership Institute, the world's first school for incumbent CEOs, and serves as the Lester Crown Professor of Management Practice at the Yale School of Management.

Stephen Henriques is a senior research fellow at the Yale Chief Executive Leadership Institute, a former advisor to the Governor of Connecticut, and a former consultant at McKinsey & Company.

The views expressed in this article are the writer's own.