Stan O'Neal did it, and it didn't work. Jimmy Cayne did it, and it didn't work. But that's not stopping Dick Fuld from doing it too.

What these Wall Street leaders did was try to save their own jobs while their firms were in turmoil by firing their subordinates. O'Neal fired Merrill Lynch's head of fixed-income trading before he was eventually ousted himself. Bear Stearns' Cayne gave chief operating officer Warren Spector his walking papers in an unsuccessful ploy to save his own job.

And this morning, Lehman Brothers' chief executive Richard Fuld announced that chief operating officer Joseph Gregory and chief financial officer Erin Callan would be removed from their posts.

Fuld named Herbert McDade chief operating officer and Ian Lowitt as Lehman's new finance chief. Callan, who only stepped into the C.F.O. role last December, will return to the firm's investment banking division in a "senior capacity," according to a statement.

The news comes at a particularly awkward time, right in between Lehman's pre-announced earnings and its scheduled final quarterly earnings call. Lehman is expected to report a loss of $2.8 billion, its first loss as a public company. It's also raising an additional $6 billion in new capital to help shore up its tainted balance sheet.

Lehman Brothers shares have plummeted more than 60 percent since the start of this year, as investors have questioned the firm's valuation metrics and lost confidence in its ability to survive as an independent company in this post-Bear world.

The market's reaction to this morning's news indicates that this may not be enough to satisfy the skeptics. Its shares fell another 10 percent in pre-market trading, after yesterday's 15 percent sell-off. After the market opened, its shares recovered.

Now the questions remain: How long will Dick Fuld last? And how long will Lehman Brothers last as an independent company?

Lehman's troubles come at a difficult time for the global financial markets, making any likely buyers scarce. In the U.S., both commercial banks and other investment banks are either struggling to turn out profits themselves, or already absorbing major acquisitions.

In Europe, the story is pretty much the same. Barclays is trying to raise additional capital right now, and UBS is still grappling with the dubious honor of having the most write-downs of any international bank.

Certain private equity players and hedge funds might desire Lehman, but the headache of dealing with the regulatory burdens that come with it might be too much to bear.

In April, Dick Fuld confidently proclaimed that the "worst is behind us." Now he really must wonder just how much of the worst still lies ahead.