[imagesource: Jacquelyn Martin/AP]

He came (or at least tried to), he sweated (including hair dye), and he most certainly did not conquer, with some truly humiliating press conferences and court showdowns that ended in ridicule and defeat.

Rudy Giuliani’s 2020 in a nutshell, really.

It should come as a surprise to no one that Rudy made Forbes’ list of the biggest career crashes of 2020, and they have picked six others that suffered “spectacular professional flame-outs” to join him.

There’s Greg Glassman, the CrossFit founder and now former CEO, who resigned in June after he said he wasn’t mourning George Floyd’s death, and pushed conspiracy theories surrounding Floyd, in leaked audio from a company Zoom meeting.

Not long after that, a blistering report from the New York Times exposed a seriously toxic workplace environment at CrossFit headquarters, with Glassman at the forefront of many of the accusations.

Forbes also picked Jeffrey Toobin, who was fired from The New Yorker Magazine after allegedly “masturbating on a Zoom video chat between members of the New Yorker and WNYC radio”.

Yeah, that will crater a career pretty quickly.

2020 was not a good year for Ron Meyer, either:

Ron Meyer stepped down as NBC Universal executive vice chairman in August after disclosing that he made a private settlement with a woman after they engaged in an extramarital affair, and that “other parties” were attempting to extort him for more money.

Image: Getty Images

In a statement given to multiple media outlets at the time, Meyer said, “Admittedly, this is a woman I had a very brief and consensual affair with many years ago. I made this disclosure because other parties learned of the settlement and have continuously attempted to extort me into paying them money…”

Trevor Milton, the founder of hydrogen truckmaker Nikola Corp., also had a dire 2020:

[He] resigned as executive chairman and stepped down from the company’s board in the wake of fraud allegations…

A September 10 report by Hindenburg Research, a New York-based financial research firm run by analyst Nate Anderson, alleged that the “breakthrough” battery system Milton said the company was working on last year doesn’t exist and that Nikola claimed to have designed technology and vehicle components that it actually purchased from other companies…

Image: Reuters/Massimo Pinca

Separately, the 38-year-old Milton has also been accused of sexual abuse by two women in incidents that occurred years before he founded Nikola, according to CNBC. Through a spokesperson, Milton reportedly denied the accusations.

Adam Rapoport, who rose to fame as foodie magazine Bon Appétit’s editor in chief, saw his demise begin when an October 2013 Instagram photo showing him in brownface for Halloween started doing the rounds.

Soon after that, accounts from food writers of a discriminatory culture at the magazine circulated:

 In a now-deleted Instagram post, Rapoport announced his resignation…

In an Instagram post on June 10, Bon Appétit publicly acknowledged instances of racial discrimination…

Weeks later, three of Bon Appétit’s Test Kitchen stars, all people of color, quit over racial discrimination issues.

Finally, there’s Troy Young, who had been sitting pretty as Hearst Magazines president, until it came crashing down.

Employees said he fostered a toxic workplace culture, and even went as far as to email pornography to an editor, and ask the pregnant editor of another magazine if the baby was his:

The report also claimed that there were instances of racial discrimination on his watch at Hearst’s Cosmopolitan and Marie Claire…

A Hearst Magazines spokeswoman said to the Times that Young’s “relentless pursuit of excellence was at times combined with a brash demeanor that rubbed some the wrong way.”

Image: Giorgio Niro

A day later, Young sent an email to staff apologizing for his behavior, and said the Times report was a misrepresentation of “the culture that we have built at Hearst Magazines.”

Young resigned later that day.

Troy is also the answer to the question “what would happen if an egg grew hair, and wore glasses and a jacket?”

It’s almost like creating a toxic work environment will eventually lead to problems down the line, right?

Perhaps some lessons will be learnt as we look forward to a better (please, be better) 2021.

See the full Forbes list here.

[source:forbes]