Coughlin resigns from Wal-Mart

CORPORATE America has been rocked by the shock resignation of leading Irish American Tom Coughlin from Wal-Mart.

Mr Coughlin was honoured with the Ireland-US Council Award for outstanding achievement in New York last year.

As the son of a second generation Irish-American police officer his achievements in corporate America were seen as a major accolade for all Irish Americans.

Earlier this year Mr Coughlin was forced to resign his top executive position in Wal-Mart. He was tipped to be the next boss of the biggest retailer in the US, whose computer system is bigger than the Pentagon’s, and which employs well over one million.

Mr Coughlin is now under investigation for expense account irregularities involving an amount of up to $500,000.

At another award ceremony when he was given the top honour by Irish-America magazine he said: “We were a have-not family - an Irish Catholic policeman with a family of 10. We weren’t what anybody would refer to as wealthy, but we never saw ourselves as poor.”

For many Mr Coughlin represented all that was good about Irish-Americans. He had been groomed by Wal-Mart founder Sam Walton and was shoo-in to take the top job at the giant retailer when the job next came up.

His dream of leading Wal-Mart turned into a nightmare when an employee complained in January he was being pressurised by Mr Coughlin to authorise $2,000 for expenses that had no receipts. The employee was sacked the following day.

As events gathered momentum Mr Coughlin was forced to resign his executive position last January and he had to quit as a director of the group as the scope of the investigation widened.

He took a total of $6m in pay and expenses from Wal-Mart last year and the allegations are a severe blow to fellow Irish-Americans who looked up to him as one of the great success stories of contemporary corporate America.

Reports from the US claim he paid trade unionists to keep him up to date on union activity that might impact on Wal-Mart which has been implacably opposed to its workers having trade unions representation.

Reports in the US said the story about the trade unions was not what the giant retailer needed right now given its recent strong efforts to project itself as a corporation that is fair.