IP: HP Way, a victim of its times

[Dave Farber <dave () farber net>]

http://www.siliconvalley.com/mld/siliconvalley/2779423.htm

Maybe Hewlett-Packard will succeed in buying Compaq, maybe not. However the
vote goes, the HP Way has withered.

But it's not entirely fair to solely blame HP's current management. The HP
Way was fading before Carly Fiorina arrived on the scene. It was a victim of
its times.

Silicon Valley grew up on the example of William Hewlett and David Packard.
Theirs was an era when actual innovation, honest hard work and concern
beyond one's own immediate sphere were core to the corporate mission.
Profits mattered, of course, because a business couldn't exist without them.
Under the HP Way, though, profits and humane values fueled each other.

The icy equations of today's shareholding and wealth-building don't account
for humanity, sorry to say. They calculate financial value only.

snip