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This morning, newly minted CEOs Tom Freston and Les Moonves helped chairman/skeletal executive presence Sumner Redstone ring the New York Stock Exchange's opening bell (gently, of course, lest Redstone's fragile bones splinter from the force of the resulting sound waves) to commemorate the official split of Viacom into the New Viacom and CBS Corp. The always exuberant Freston was so excited by the creation of his new media kingdom that he rushed back to the office and dashed off a manifesto defining it for all of his subjects, whose stated "key values" of Creative Excellence, Reinvention, Global, Diversity and Inclusion, and Social Commitment and Ethics should ease the paranoia about DreamWorks-related layoffs at Paramount and soothe the sting of rival Moonves's instant five-percent stock price jump. Said Freston in a company-wide e-mail:

These values will provide the basis for our company culture. Do not underestimate the competitive advantage of a healthy company culture these days. Just look at how many companies fail here. Our primary goal is to make this the place where the best people want to come, to stay, and to do their best work.

You know, until they're mass-shitcanned next week.

The entire e-mail follows after the jump:

01/03/2006 10:54 AM Date: January 3, 2006 cc: Sumner Redstone To: New Viacom From: Tom Freston

Re: Hello There

Welcome back, folks.

I hope you had a chance to relax over the holidays. It’s the first day back and we are already off to quite a start.

This morning, Sumner Redstone and I rang the "opening bell" at the New York Stock Exchange to announce the beginning of our new company, the new Viacom.

This new Viacom is streamlined and focused. We have only 4 divisions now – ones that fit neatly together: BET Networks, Famous Music, MTV Networks, and Paramount Pictures. Our new company is smaller, more nimble, and will be much better integrated. Our vision is simple. We want to be the leading global, consumer-focused, branded entertainment company. We want to have the most respected, most successful companies, and the best in class brands that live across television, motion pictures, and digital media platforms.

2006 looks to be an exciting first year for us. We have great plans in place and we are surrounded with opportunity. We intend to be a growth company and plan to be that by continuing to creatively innovate, by continuing to extend our businesses, and by buying some new businesses like we did last year with Neopets, iFilm, and, of course, Dreamworks, the legendary movie studio created by the great talents of Steven Spielberg, Jeffrey Katzenberg, and David Geffen.

We will continue to empower each of the divisions of our company to run their own operations. I know that each division has its own culture and tradition and we will always respect that. But I do want some things to transcend as shared values and common themes for the company, to give us not only advantage in the marketplace, but to define us as a company in terms of what we stand for.

Briefly, here’s what I want to be the key values for the "new" Viacom:

1. Creative Excellence: Easily number one. It comes first. Creativity and innovation have built this company, gotten us where we are, and will continue to be the major driver of our continued success.

2. Reinvention: We need to embrace constant change and not focus on protecting "status quo," especially these days. Stay still and we will lose. This is about new markets, new platforms, new content, new imaging, new business strategies. We must always be open to the new idea and never believe we have it completely right.

3. Global. It's a big world out there and an increasing part of our growth will come from outside the U.S. We must be comfortable and proficient everywhere in the world. With our brands and businesses we are already well positioned and connected to succeed on this front.

4. Diversity and Inclusion. We will not be healthy and we will not thrive without these values. We are an entertainment company in the modern world, a world with increasingly diverse populations. There is no way, no way, we can be successful unless the people in our company look and think like the audiences we seek to reach. And diversity doesn't just mean a good mix of races, genders, and sexual orientations either. It also means being really open to diverse points of view.

5. Social Commitment and Ethics. We will get better by doing good, by giving back and doing it right. As a media company we have amazing capabilities here and will continue to use these for a variety of pro-social issues that you advocate. We will also always behave in an ethical way. This is also, by the way, very good for business.

These values will provide the basis for our company culture. Do not underestimate the competitive advantage of a healthy company culture these days. Just look at how many companies fail here. Our primary goal is to make this the place where the best people want to come, to stay, and to do their best work.

We are coming out of the starting gate in great shape, with strong momentum. We are all now in a brand new company with amazing assets and just an incredibly talented group of people. This is a big day and I’m excited about what lies ahead for all of us.

Happy New Year.