Transparency a la Deloitte - i.e. "leak"

Even though it is an audit and tax services company, which promotes compliance with corporate governance and transparency, Deloitte Romania leaked its information one day before making it public, to a carefully selected publication.

Yesterday, the company organized a press conference, which according to the invitation sent by email, had the presentation of the "Deloitte Central Europe Top 500" report on its agenda.

What is interesting is that details surrounding this report appeared yesterday as well, in one Romanian financial publication.

At the conference, our journalist asked about the purpose of the conference, considering that details from the study had already been published.

PR Manager Ana Maria Gavrilă responded that the meeting was intended to allow the attending businesspeople to "network", hence contradicting the announcement on the invitation.

It would seem Mrs. Ana Maria Gavrilă knows better, hence why she contradicts Ahmed Hassan, Managing Partner at Deloitte România, who, in the email he sent and signed himself, was inviting us at the press conference "to review the report, together with some of the minds behind the financial achievements of the biggest companies in Romania".

The explanation provided to our journalist by Ana Maria Gavrilă was interesting to say the least: "Publishing the chart in a financial publication represents a < private discussion >, just like the absence of the journalists dedicated to the presentation of the chart".

Aha!, we finally got it: the information leak is public, but the discussion around it is private.

In turn, we inform Ana Maria Gavrilă that we know what she is going to tell us, before having that private discussion: that she has remained sentimental, considering that she has previously worked for the media trust in question.

Of course, under these awkward circumstances, created by Deloitte, the presence of the press at yesterday's event was redundant.

We are however proud that Deloitte opted to leak information in a Romanian newspaper, rather than in one from another country.

At least our national pride is satisfied.