"Suicide Report" says France Telecom has only "a few weeks" to put its house in order.

The Technologia report, broken in the French Sunday newspapers and by the International Herald Tribune, unequivocally states that France Telecom's new top management (the previous CEO, Didier Lombard, fell on his sword as the crisis deepened and the French government got involved in the innermost workings of what is ostensibly a private company) must move as quickly as possible “to take charge and encourage radical change” if it is to recover its former status in the eyes of the public, shareholders, workers analysts, the French state and indeed the country as a whole.

The report had been commissioned by the incumbent national telco in the torrid aftermath of the suicides, since 2008, of 43 employees of France Telecom. Families of the deceased and FT's trades unions have claimed that the suicides were a direct and forseeable result of job changes ruthlessly driven through, forced relocation of staff, endless reorganisations and restructurings, the sudden closure of work sites and units and job cutting exercises.

After the Sarkozy administration stepped into the affair FT agreed to discontinue a series of programmes and initiatives that had been identified by staff and unions as being "particularly disruptive" and the new CEO, Stéphane Richard, has been told that the carrier has next to no time to prove that it has learned some lessons and reverts to a more enlightened, inclusive and collaborative form of management - or things will get worse.

That'll be a tall order and an FT spokesperson, Jean-Bernard Orsoni, whilst admitting that the company is indeed in receipt of the Technologia report,and is now in negotiation about the implementations of its recommendations with various trades unions.