In Defense of ‘Early Show’ Producer Shelley Ross -- Daily Intel -- New York News Blog -- New York Magazine

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Shelley Ross, the executive producer of CBS' Early Show, whose staffers were complaining about her last week, has been out of the office all week, and her things "were seen being taken out of her office" yesterday. "Page Six" thinks she's probably been fired, and they give a whole rundown of the terrible sins she supposedly committed against her staff, culminating in a quote from former colleague Charlie Gibson, who reportedly muttered at a funeral they both attended over the weekend, "It took us six years to get rid of her. How come it only took them five months?" Maybe it's because we once had a boss who instituted an office-wide "tackling policy" and occasionally spoke to us through the zipper on his pants, but we maintain our position that Ross's staff sounds like a bunch of babies and that she has been, perhaps, unfairly maligned.

Sure, 21 people have left the show since she started. "I can't stand working here anymore. I can't stand people being humiliated this way," one producer said. And, yes, she did ask a guy to reschedule a colonoscopy because it was sweeps month. But look at it this way: It wasn't like she offered to give him the colonoscopy herself. And, okay, she make a grown man read an apology to his colleagues after he made a crack about Early Show stories not being credible. But a good daytime-show manager knows that news stories are like Tinker Bell: They're only real if everyone believes in them. So it was really for the common good. After all the nasty Page Six items, Shelley decided to clear the air: She called a meeting for the staff, a CBS source tells us,* in to order encourage everyone to "air their complaints" about her to her face while she sobbed. "Not a lot of people spoke up," a source tells "Page Six." "They were nervous. Shelley tends to be…slightly vindictive." Wusses. And would you really call acting like "a screaming, raving lunatic" vindictive? We think that's just the manifestation of hurt feelings.

*This has been corrected from the original version. Previously Intel thought CBS called the meeting, in fact, Ross called the meeting herself.

Shelley Ross Not Expected Back at CBS' 'Early Show' [Page Six]
Related: The ‘Early Show’ Office Is More or Less As Dysfunctional As Yours