Hemmings plays the victim (again) as he tries to move on from past failures
There’s a simple reason that business owners who are central to multiple unsuccessful companies continue their pattern – they don’t accept responsibility.
As I outlined last year when I dissected Ephram Stephenson’s attempt to explain the collapse of the Collar Group, Stephenson attempted, in a podcast interview, to accept responsibility for Collar’s cashflow crisis and ultimate collapse, but he couldn’t bring himself to do it.
Stephenson just wanted to keep looking to the future, rather than being confronted with the reality of how his behaviour as sole director and CEO, caused so much financial and emotional damage to hundreds of people.
Whether Stephenson has genuinely reflected on his behaviour and learned anything about personal responsibility will be revealed in the not-too-distant future as he attempts to build his new business, Leo Jackson.
The latest recruitment agency owner to fail the hall-of-mirrors test of personal responsibility is Luke Hemmings.
Yesterday, Hemmings took to LinkedIn, in a typical display of victimhood that has been the man’s hallmark, to announce a ‘day of closure’.
In his tedious and narcissistic post, Hemmings whined long and hard about the “….serious allegations, sustained finger-pointing and intense scrutiny” surrounding the collapse of his Canberra recruitment agency, Coceptive (which morphed into Whitefox Recruitment).
Hemmings bemoaned the “…repeated attempts to paint the worst possible version of my involvement before the full process had run its course, and the weight of living under that level of scrutiny from 2021 through to 2026 is difficult to properly put into words.”
Playing the heavy-the-head-that-wears-the-crown line, Hemmings lamented, “Directors are often required to make difficult decisions in real time, under pressure, and in circumstances where there is no easy path. In that case, I exercised my discretion as a director, and as someone involved in the management of the company, in what I believed were the best interests of the firm and all stakeholders connected to it.”
Showing a puddle-like depth of maturity and Trump-like willingness to reflect on his own behavior, Hemmings just wants to move on (and hopes we will too).
“With the formal administration process now having come to an end, I consider that chapter closed.
My current businesses are separate entities, operating separately, and they are not embroiled in that historical matter. They should not be conflated with events arising from a different company, in a different jurisdiction, during a different chapter of my life.
My attention remains firmly on the present, on the businesses I lead today, and on continuing to move forward with clarity, discipline and purpose.”
How self-indulgent.
How predictable.
No willingness to admit any responsibility
No apology.
No reflection on lessons learned.
Just onwards toward a slightly different version of the same failures Hemmings has presided over time and time again.
Related blogs
Australia’s most shameless recruiter commits to repaying $548k to avoid fraud charges
Stephenson tries, and fails, to take full responsibility for Collar’s demise
The Myer conman is back and 8 years later he’s a pretend teacher
Serial shonky recruitment agency owner charged with fraud
Ephram Stephenson starts another recruitment business
Collar had $28k in the bank and debts of $28 million when it went under