S4C bullying report: the full shocking details

Martin Shipton

A range of shocking and disturbing bullying behaviours by S4C chief executive Sian Doyle were reported by multiple witnesses and led to her dismissal, an independent report has revealed.

The broadcaster’s board commissioned Cardiff law firm Capital Law in Mau to conduct an investigation into allegations initially made by the trade union BECTU.

A version of the inquiry report has now been published, redacted to protect the identity of complainants.

Unsettled

It states: “The overriding theme of the evidence we received was centred around the behaviours and actions of S4C’s Chief Executive Officer, Sian Doyle and (but to a lesser extent) the Chief Content Officer, Llinos Griffin-Williams, and how they went about their work and how it unsettled the organisation.

“Sian Doyle and her behaviour was a prominent theme brought up again and again. We received examples of her behaviour from former employees, third parties and current employees of each of the three S4C offices, from different levels within the organisation and from different departments.

“Considering the number of participants who commented, and the number of examples given, Sian Doyle’s behaviour was highlighted as having the most significant negative impact on the working environment and atmosphere within S4C.

“Most examples are of Sian Doyle’s alleged bad behaviour (87.9%). Of those, 37 participants’ (26 current employees and 11 former employees) view was that Sian Doyle’s management style was confrontational, abusive and inconsiderate.

“Sian Doyle’s behaviour was said to have had a significant impact on 18 current employees. Many of the examples provided were not proven by documentary evidence, nor evidence from more than one witness, but there was a clear theme. Some of the evidence is of significant specific events whilst other evidence is of minor incidents, repeated creating a pattern. We report on both.

“We received 116 examples of Sian Doyle’s behaviour, 101 of which have been categorised as alleged bad behaviour. There are 15 examples categorised as alleged good behaviour.

“The 101 alleged examples of Sian Doyle’s bad behaviour were provided by 29 participants. Of the 29 participants who provided examples of Sian Doyle’s alleged bad behaviour, 18 were current S4C employees, 9 were former S4C employees, and 2 had left the organisation since the start of the process.

“The 15 examples of Sian Doyle’s alleged good behaviour have been provided by 12 participants. Of the 15 examples of Sian Doyle’s alleged good behaviour, 4 are from the participants that also provided examples of Sian Doyle’s alleged bad behaviour.

“Of the 12 participants who had provided examples of Sian Doyle’s alleged good behaviour, 3 were former S4C employees and 9 were current S4C employees. Of the 12 participants who had provided good examples of Sian Doyle’s behaviour, 6 of them were appointed whilst she was CEO.

Bad behaviour

16 pages of the Evidence Report quote examples of bad behaviour whilst 2 pages quote examples of good behaviour.”

The report states: “Although participants recognised that change is needed within S4C, and that the general strategic direction that Sian Doyle was working towards was a positive one, the participants described how Sian Doyle had failed to bring S4C colleagues with her in implementing and managing this change.

“The several reports from witnesses are summarised in these contributions:

* It was reported that the Chief Executive had made it clear that to deliver change in the workplace, anxiety rather than trust was required and that they understood that the Chief Executive wanted staff to feel insecure at work to achieve this.

* It was said that there was a: “..culture of zero critical discourse and she has created a situation where there is no analysis of the truth, the truth gets presented in a way that Sian sees it and the management team do not challenge her because the culture has gone to such an extent that we do not have the right to challenge and in my opinion, to do the job we are supposed to do. I would describe the atmosphere as a type of ‘compliance or die’.”

“Many of the participants described situations where they had seen Sian Doyle behave abusively whilst discussing S4C colleagues and their work. This was described in various ways, but participants referred to her targeting specific colleagues in public and her use of swearwords and derogatory language whilst discussing them. This led to an unpleasant feeling and of mistrust among participants.

“There are numerous reports of the Chief Executive being rude or disparaging about colleagues in internal meetings or in public. Examples include:

* Disparaging comments about S4C programmes and their presenters. In one example, in relation to a specific programme, the Chief Executive was reported as saying: “who the fuck are [redacted – presenters]? Who is watching this rubbish?”

* “Sian Doyle just started saying about [a former staff member] who no longer works at S4C. She was just wild and then said: “he has to go. I’m not going to have anyone like that working here”. That is a paraphrase of her words. She was just telling a room full: “that’s it. He has to go. I’m going to get rid of him.”

* In one conversation about a colleague Sian Doyle was reported as saying: ‘She’s fucking gone, she shows me no respect. ‘I’ll get rid of her like that.”

“The participants described their feelings of frustration with the way Sian Doyle was publicly very critical about Clic [S4C’s viewing app] twice: at a management team meeting on 27/1/2022 and at a wider staff meeting on 28/4/2022, and there is a video of the latter and the comments made at it.

“We also received copies of SLACK messages between S4C staff members who were involved with Clic. Evidence that captures their comments immediately after the staff meeting on 28/4/2022.

“The evidence showed the adverse effect that Sian Doyle’s comments had on the morale of the staff who had worked on Clic and the participants described their disappointment that these comments about Clic had been made publicly, rather than directly and privately to the individuals concerned in a professional manner.

“Participants reported that Sian Doyle’s leadership style was: ‘dictatorial creating a culture of fear’. Many of the participants described the negative impact of this on them and their work, with many being reluctant to challenge the Chief Executive and afraid to state their own ideas or views to her. We were told that this caused many S4C staff to feel generally scared in the workplace.

“There are many reports of people considering that they had to do what the Chief Executive said, whether they agreed or not, with her saying:

* ‘Are you with me or not, are you with me or not?’ and: ‘it’s me or the chair, you have to choose who you are loyal to, me or the chairman’?

* A participant reported that when attempting to provide feedback to the Chief Executive it was made clear that their opinion was neither welcomed nor valued.

“As well as many participants considering that Sian Doyle’s leadership was ‘dictatorial’, we heard from many people who considered her to be confrontational. There were a number of examples of this, but providing details and quotations in this section, in particular, might breach the confidentiality of the witnesses. Several reports suggest individuals were berated in meetings with many other staff present but the evidence is very personal

“At least one incident was described where upsetting behaviour and challenging body language resulted in a staff member being in tears and needing to be comforted by others present.

“An example of Sian Doyle’s leadership style was her alleged regular use of the phrase: ‘Shoot one and a thousand tremble’. This was raised by many participants and witnessed first-hand by 3.

“This exchange is an example:

Investigator: “Have you heard Sian say [‘shoot one and a thousand tremble]?”

[Redacted]: “Yes, and the entire management team has heard Sian say this several times.”

“We heard that participants felt that Sian Doyle disregarded experience, expertise and past successes. One witness said:

* “I’ve worked under 5 chief executives, a good relationship, a number of chairmen, with an interim chief executive and I have never felt so worthless as I was working for Sian.”

“Witnesses said how they were ignored and/or avoided by Sian Doyle at work and at work events, and this quote captures the evidence:

* A staff member said: “Nothing was said to me. No thank you. Nothing. Nothing.’ They further described a challenging environment where they felt persistently ignored by the CEO during conversations with key stakeholders which led to another manager apologising for the behaviour of the Chief Executive.

“Witnesses spoke of frustration with how Sian Doyle conducted herself during meetings, either ignoring people or using negative body language, such as rolling her eyes, to cast disdain. This evidence is encapsulated by this quote:

* ‘So, for months this conversation went on and every time we did it, there was a period for three, four months where I don’t think I finished one sentence because the moment I started talking in any meeting, she would interrupt, she would look sarky. If I was making a point that she disagreed with she would roll her eyes at me and at other people around the table in quite a public way in order to try to undermine the point I was doing.’

“Witnesses described occasions where they considered Sian Doyle’s behaviour to be disrespectful towards S4C colleagues and of the work of S4C staff. For example, one witness spoke of speaking with the CEO at an event about a new programme which had been well received but which the CEO chose to belittle publicly.

“Another illustration was provided by a participant who reported that Sian Doyle said forcefully, when being offered advice and a briefing: “Who is the Chief Executive?”, giving the impression that the advice and briefing didn’t count and that only the Chief Executives opinion counted.

“On two separate occasions, it was alleged that Sian Doyle had asked colleagues about their sickness / health absence in front of other colleagues. An example of this is of the Chief Executive asking a colleague to join her in a public discussion with others then asking her about a specific private health issue.

“We heard from several participants that they consider Sian Doyle to be supportive, with work issues and personal issues that they had faced. For example:

* “Sian, the Chief Executive, always makes a point of saying hello, and making sure I’m ok.”

* “She’s supportive, she’s flexible, she’s easy going but I know where I stand too.”

*- “- the Chief Executive sorry – has been very supportive of me over the years they have been in the role. I believe they have been very ambitious, and the channel’s visibility has been global since they started, and they have been a lot of help to me.”

Commissioners

So far as Chief Content Officer Llinos Griffin Williams is concerned, the report states: “The Chief Content Officer came in for criticism for how she dealt with the S4C commissioners, a key layer of experience and influence within the organisation.

They share significant responsibility for S4C’s content, and they have influence over the implementation of the organisation’s strategic objectives. We heard from a range of people, both working within and outside S4C, who were unhappy about and critical of the working environment and the atmosphere at S4C, such that it had a negative effect on the commissioners and, thereby, on the output of the organisation.

“Five Commissioners expressed frustration that decisions and responsibilities had been taken away from them and centralised in the hands of Llinos Griffin Williams who, in their opinion, micromanaged whilst being unable to makedecisions promptly. The participants also said that many decisions were made by Llinos Griffin Williams without their input. This had a wider paralysing effect.

Examples included:

* “From the very beginning, Llinos Griffin Williams was discussing with companies before chatting with us as commissioners e.g. a [redacted – producer] told me that Llinos Griffin Williams wants to appoint more people for the commissioning team as an additional resource. It’s unbelievable that Llinos Griffin Williams had not discussed this with us.”

* “Everything went through Llinos, which is fine because she is in her job, but if you’re going to do that you have to be available. If you want to micromanage that, you have to be available because things just come to stop. Small things like deciding who is allowed to appear, or if I ask for advice in an email, you have to come in, and then when I have signed off a program, she came in and changed and said I wantto see this and then made changes, just undermine my editorial eyes…”

* A participant reported a clear pattern of lack of internal communication with commissioners and described an example where a proposition for a series had been shared with the independent productionsector but not communicated with the internal colleagues responsible for that area of work.

“Three Commissioners expressed their frustrations that, after the appointment of Llinos Griffin Williams there was an environment of disorganised work, with meetings repeatedly cancelled. They said that they relied on those meetings to share ideas and confirm plans. The commissioners explained that the cancellation of such meetings created instability and contributed to bad feelings between them and Llinos Griffin Williams.

An example is:

* “1:2:1 meeting gets cancelled all the time. Normally we would get 121’s every two weeks with the Head of Content. Since Llinos Griffin Williams came these meetings are very rare things. This leads to a delay before being able to answer production companies which often means that many companies are angry and frustrated.”

“Two commissioners said there was a lack of communication about important decisions. Specific examples were provided, such as convening a group meeting at short notice unexpectedly involving the head of HR (perceived as ominous) only later to learn (after asking) that it was to discuss a significant restructuring within the commissioning team.

“We heard from 5 participants from external companies that they knew of the breakdown in the relationship between the Chief Content Officer and the commissioners and that there was growing concern about the effect of her approach on the commissioning department.

“This led to disfunction and miscommunication in the sector as rumours circulated about what the CCO wanted commissioned, with the commissioners believing that they didn’t know what was going on such that they had to ask independent producers what they knew about what the CCO was up to.

“Both present and former employees of S4C, and some external witnesses, talked of the breakdown in the relationship between the commissioners and the Chief Content Officer leading to them being very negative and hostile towards her.”

Dismissed

Ms Griffin was dismissed following an incident during the Rugby World Cup in France when she engaged in a drunken rant.

Considering the effect of the bullying on the organisation, the report said: “During the process, the welfare of some of the participants became a concern, because they were clearly uncomfortable and/or upset and some broke down during our meetings with them, especially while detailing their feelings about the work environment and the atmosphere within S4C.

In addition, we heard about a serious incident at an S4C management team meeting between 21/2/2023-22/2/2023 at which one employee suffered a significant health event.

“During our meetings 10 of the participants broke down crying, mostly while discussing their experiences in the S4C workplace.11 participants reported on the detrimental effects that they considered the work environment at S4C had on their health.

Examples included:

1. “I left because I didn’t feel for any reason that I had a choice but to leave the cause of the situation. The Chief Executive had put me in a very nasty position, many other staff too, I was aware of that. But my friends and my family worried a lot about my mental health at the time. I had become very tearful. I couldn’t sleep. And the atmosphere at work during the last few months of employment at S4C were very difficult and I didn’t feel like I had a choice but to leave.”

2. One participant described how the: “atmosphere had changed completely” following the appointment of the Chief Executive. They felt that the: “impossible work requirements” and the subsequent pressure contributed to them being unable to work due to depression and anxiety.

“Between 21/2/2023 and 22/2/2023 the management team met at an away day where an employee suffered a significant health event. This incident was raised by 18 participants of which 5 had been present, 13 having heard of it by word of mouth. To protect the confidentiality of the individual, and because of her medical condition even though she didn’t ask for anonymity, we have significantly summarised the evidence.

“The employee described an animated conversation involving the Chief Executive and other senior staff members about the level of change that was required at S4C. This included replacing many staff who were described as: “not worth worrying about” and that the Chief Executive suggested a lot of the staff at S4C did not have the skills or knowledge to be able to justify being in their jobs. She described potentially losing: “at least 50 of them”.

“The witness said she was distressed and challenged the CEO about what she was suggesting. She described how she believed that the stressful situation then contributed to the significant health event she suffered that day, for which she was taken to hospital to receive treatment.

“The other 4 direct witnesses who were close to the leading of the event, three members of the senior management team and the facilitator, didn’t consider the meeting to be abnormal.

“Many participants expressed significant dissatisfaction with the working environment and the atmosphere at S4C and, very often, their reasons for feeling dissatisfied are based on examples of alleged behaviour by Sian Doyle and/or Llinos Griffin Williams.

“However, it became clear to us that the feelings of some participants were based on stories or gossip from colleagues and that they did not witness these events themselves. It can be seen from the evidence, therefore, that the spread of stories, especially about Sian Doyle and Llinos Griffin Williams, contributed negatively to the working environment and the atmosphere in S4C causing disorganisation, dissatisfaction and dysfunction.

“During the process, 19 participants commented on alleged bad behaviour by Sian Doyle and Llinos Griffin Williams, not based on what they had seen but, rather, based on what they had heard second-hand from other members of staff.

The evidence includes:

1. The: ‘Shoot one and a thousand tremble’ comment by the Chief Executive Officer, reported first hand too.

2. The management away day incident.

3. Comments made by Sian Doyle about a former staff member to: “get rid of him”.

4. Micromanaging by Sian Doyle and Llinos GriffinWilliams.

5. The virtual staff meeting on 12th December 2022. One witness described an exchange between an individual and Sian Doyle where she was rude to a colleague who asked a question, and the colleague was later referred to HR for doing so.

“An event was held for S4C staff at Boom Battle Bar in Cardiff on 19th April 2023, where it was alleged that Llinos Griffin Williams called S4C staff: ‘twats’ and blew smoke in a colleague’s face.

“Many participants spoke of the lack of order within S4C and the way this disorganisation had a detrimental effect on the working environment and atmosphere. The examples given to us by different participants were varied and often unrelated to each other, but the effect on the participants was similar and they spoke about frustration and reduced productivity. Here are two examples:

* “I’m lost and I have no idea what’s going on in terms of what’s getting commissioned and what is the discussion around that.”

* “The biggest issue I think, again with them, is a point I made earlier, and one of the points I wanted to discuss is was just how many meetings [redacted] and [redacted] cancel weekly. That is, to give you an idea. I’ve spied on the history of the last four/ five weeks and there have been 17 meetings cancelled by [redacted] and [redacted]. Weekly now, and that’s 3 ½ meetings a week cancelled.

“Negative comments were made about three teams or divisions in S4C: the Caernarfon office, the Press and Marketing teams and the HR department. To some extent or another they have all been impacted by the disorganisation, dissatisfaction and dysfunction that we report hit S4C.

Well-being

We’ve reported on the impact of the events in this report on the health and well-being of many at S4C and, with that in mind, that people involved in those teams will remain employed and colleagues, we have not provided extensive quotations or paraphrasing of the evidence about them.

“The evidence received about these teams was not confined to those who worked within them, but also from the wider workforce.

“Participants raised issues regarding the performance of the team and some raised concerns over micromanagement. We heard that the Press and Marketing teams have faced significant changes throughout 2022 which naturally affected their work environment and the atmosphere in S4C. Participants described the additional workload experienced after the departure of several team members. Several were dissatisfied with the time it took to fill vacancies, which led to intensified work pressure and contributed to a feeling of a lack of direction, whilst others said that the added pressure had a detrimental effect on their health.

“Despite the impact of this on the Press and Marketing teams we heard that a few recent appointments have been made in key roles and it was said that this has eased their pressure of work. In summary, a negative working environment across the Press and Marketing teams was reported by several respondents with a lack of support being as a consistent theme. The teams have been through considerable change and a challenging time from which it needs to rebuild.

“Although the S4C office in Caernarfon is the workplace for a cross-section of employees and members of various teams across the organisation, the contribution from individuals who work there was striking. Several staff members based in Caernarfon gave evidence and the tenor of their contribution was consistent. There was a widespread feeling that the Caernarfon office was an unhappy and negative workplace, feeling isolated from the rest of the organisation and that there was a lack of support for those working there.

“We heard from many witnesses that they were dissatisfied with the working environment and the atmosphere within S4C but, despite this, there was a reluctance from many to share their feelings and discuss them with S4C’s HR department, particularly if the issues were in relation to senior management.

“There was evidence of a disconnect between the HR department and the wider workforce, with some concerned that staff were reluctant to trust the department to act on concerns or keep issues confidential and that the HR team was perceived by some as being too close to the Chief Executive and the senior management team.

“There did, though, seem to be a misunderstanding by some of the witnesses about the role of HR. Whilst HR departments facilitate support to employees, they must also work closely with management teams and senior individuals. But an HR department must be believed by the members of organisation to perform those roles even handedly and to maintain the right balance between them.”

Chairman

Regarding S4C chairman Rhodri Williams, the report states: “Some individuals raised concerns about Rhodri Williams and alleged he intensified the pressure on some, by negatively affecting the working atmosphere and environment within S4C for them. Whilst some of these concerns relate to the Chairman personally, others could be described as directed at the Authority and some of its decisions.

“One witness expressed concern about Rhodri Williams’ behaviour during a meeting between the Non-Executive Members of the Board and the Management Team on 15/6/2023, after the letter from BECTU and after our investigation started, which was witnessed by others.

“This issue relates to a grievance raised by Llinos Griffin Williams about the Chairman’s behaviour. This was subject to a separate process and investigation, distinct from this fact-finding investigation, which concluded soon after the allegation was raised.

“One witness alleged that the Chair raised his voice on a telephone call and also alleged that he repeatedly: “berated” them for not making progress in removing a staff member.

“Another witness said that the Chair knew of the issues in the workplace at S4C before the BECTU letter was received and had therefore been misleading in a media interview in May, but this interview was widely reported and this is an isolated view.

“Whilst some of these concerns set out in this section relate to the Chairman personally, others could be described as directed at the Authority and some of its decisions. One witness disliked the Chairman dealing with the media about the investigation before, or at the same time as, staff were finding out what was going on. They said: ‘The Chair’s internal decision to characterise the nature of the complaints in BECTU’s letter as not making comfortable reading, if true, would cause us worry, and not the kind of things that any one responsible for any kind of body would like to read, were unwise, and no specialist body would advise making such statements publicly in such circumstances.’

“This was a feeling echoed by 5 witnesses who felt that the BECTU letter should have been handled more delicately.

“It’s just the way the letter from the union…. just exploded in the news and so on. I’m not a member of the union so I didn’t know anything about it. It came as a shock to me. We didn’t know… an email came after hours work from the Chairman; I believe. . I saw it but there were a lot from the office that hadn’t seen it, just seen the story on the news.’

“This theme continued with four witnesses speaking in one way or another about the way the Chair had taken charge of communications throughout this period and what he said. One believed he been briefing the media behind the scenes and that this had made the situation worse. One said:

‘The Chair has repeatedly gone out and briefed the press without letting us know and we’ve had to read in the press what he said about this. … even though we have a comms specialist, we asked for crisis comms to be brought in, he put himself in charge of all the communication, which again is something that I’ve never experienced in any other organisation.’

“Two witnesses felt that insufficient regard was had to the impact of the investigation on their health, one of which said that this was brought directly to the attention of the board. They also felt that they should have been provided with legal support during the process.”

Fact-finding

Explaining how the redacted version was put together, the report states: “Two lawyers were specifically tasked to undertake a fact-finding exercise – to listen and to report back what was heard. These investigators gathered evidence from members of staff, former members of staff and people who previously worked with S4C who wanted to contribute to the process and share their comments about the working environment and the atmosphere inside it.

“The Authority decided that those who gave evidence must be sure that they were doing so confidentially, with anonymity if they wanted that, and many did (so the investigators reported all the evidence anonymously). The investigators’ Evidence Report, together with transcripts of what each witness said, were presented to S4C’s Secretary and Chair and another team of Capital Law lawyers, who worked separately and independently from the investigators, to advise the Authority about it. The decisions to appoint both teams within Capital Law were made by the Authority on behalf of S4C.

“Given the promise of confidentiality to the witnesses and the request of anonymity made by many, it has been challenging to provide this Report with sufficient clarity and supporting evidence. The Authority has been given a comprehensive report on the evidence supported by extensive quotations from the witnesses, to enable them to make the decisions required of them, but we have had to paraphrase most of those quotations in this report so that the witnesses can’t be identified, or that they don’t have to worry that they might be identified.

“We had to prioritise protecting the witnesses’ identities, particularly as some of them reported being traumatised and nervous about giving evidence. We must therefore state clearly, for the avoidance of any doubt, that when we have been unable to quote from a witness, the evidence exists and has been seen by the Authority’s members.

“This Report, therefore, provides a distillation of the extensive evidence received. It cannot be the full record of all the evidence provided for the reasons given above. Generally, reports such as this try to lay out the evidence anonymously to protect the privacy of those involved. Given the nature of this situation, and that the weight of the evidence was that the issues at S4C about its working environment and atmosphere were caused by specific people, it was impossible not to name them. If we hadn’t done so it would still have been obvious who was being discussed.

“We were not required by the Terms of Reference to make recommendations about what the Authority should so because of the evidence we received, and we have not done so.This report only deals with the evidence provided to Capital Law up until the end of the fact-finding investigation. It does not deal with any matters raised since, whether in the media or in correspondence.

“95 individuals volunteered to take part in the process but three changed their minds and didn’t do so.

Of the 92 participants that took part in the process:

* 46 of them were current employees at S4C;

* 14 of them were former employees of S4;,

* 28 were independent of S4C but had previously worked with S4C;

* 3 had left their employment with S4C since the process started.and

* 1 did not reveal their name.”