Right before the weekend, we have some interesting news from Hewlett Packard, hardware and software maker, but most of all (at least to me) owner of Palm and its assets. CEO of HP, Mark Hurd, has resigned, effective immediately, after the board found out he had behaved “inappropriately” towards a former HP marketing contractor which “violated HP’s Standards of Business Conduct”. Cathie Lesjak has been appointed interim CEO while the company seeks a new one.
A former HP contractor had filed a sexual harassment claim against Mark Hurd, but after an outside investigation it was determined that this claim was false. Still, several other facts came to light that made Hurd’s position as CEO untenable; he “failed to disclose a close personal relationship he had with the contractor that constituted a conflict of interest, failed to maintain accurate expense reports, and misused company assets”.
Each of these constitute a violation of HP’s Standards of Business Conduct, and on top of that, they “demonstrated a profound lack of judgement” that severely undermined Hurd’s credibility within the company. The contractor in question was a marketing contractor, and she has chosen not to come forward.
While Cathie Lesjak will act as interim CEO for the time being, a committee led by former Netscape CEO Marc Andreessen will commence the search for a new CEO. Engadget asked if Palm’s Jon Rubinstein might be a candidate, but the company is not yet ready to talk names.
Interesting turn of events, but hey, what goes around comes around. Good on HP for acting this decisively, and making sure that even the CEO honors the code of conduct.
…I’ve seen some… “questionable” actions taken/reasons given in employee hiring and firing in my time.
Microsoft already infiltrated their guy as a chef of OS and software division at HP.
http://www.businessweek.com/news/2010-05-05/hewlett-packard-names-b…
Microsoft is scared that HP might strongly push Linux over Windows on servers, so they are probably removing Hurd because he isn’t doing enough to help Microsoft’s anti-Linux jihad.
I expect to see Microsoft guy replacing Hurd.
I believe Mr. Little Bill is behind this and was speaking for Mr. Big Bill and he went out of his way to forge company expenses to hide all the “gifts” he paid for to make Mr. Little Bill happy. He clearly shows he is an idiot.
Any CEO at his level in the Valley can pick his choice of women to have a relationship, on their won exceedingly large dime. He has as much ethics as Carly.
Good riddance.
It says so in the summary.
Gifts as expenses probably would not be a problem, but making deals because of “services” provided can annoy shareholders quite a bit.
Let’s wait and see what happens when new CEO gets appointed. I think it will be Rick Belluzzo all over again.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Belluzzo
http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=belluzzo&defid=38616…
I hope they won’t hire such a guy. HP is one of the top-selling netbooks that preload Linux on it. Also it would be a huge setback for Palm acquisition (Will this guy kill also WebOS in favour of Windows Mobile 7 ?)
Well, it looks like Larry Ellison also thinks that there was no ‘sexual harassment’.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2010/aug/10/oracle-boss-blasts-h…
“Publishing known false sexual harassment claims is not good corporate governance; it’s cowardly corporate governance”
It was Microsoft harassment that Hurd did, not sexual harassment.
Call me cynical, but isn’t that what most CEO’s do today?
I mean half the CEO’s today have been indicted, are on other boards to facilitate massive board collusion…(i.e. Shell Oil execs on GM’s Board then expecting gas efficient cars seems to be well….stupid.)
Smells fishy.
-Hack
Very appropriate observation :-P.
Half of the CEOs of all corporations have been indicted?
Exaggerate much?
I always knew that guy had a defective kernel.
“HP has an extremely talented executive team supported by a dedicated and customer focused work force.”
How pathetic…
“customer focused work force” Well, you know, all that dirty crowd who actually doing all the work.
Yeah, it requires talent to sell the most expensive liquid on planet.
“Yeah, it requires talent to sell the most expensive liquid on planet.”
That would be BP, not HP
haha now I get it. You were talking about printer ink, not sweet crude.
Can’t they simply do their work without putting their hands on the hired help? I blame the proliferation of Viagra for this. ;-P
This is more common than you think.
Mark Hurd just got caught.
Henry Nicholas from Broadcom did much worse: http://www.thesmokinggun.com/documents/crime/billionaire-drug-bust
Now you know where the “profits” from many of these companies go. They don’t go to re-investing into the technology in a lot of cases. They go to hiding the screwups of many C-levels, and a lot of things that shareholders never know about because they’re hidden very well in the financial reports.
A lot of C-level executives treat their companies like piggy banks with their pick of sexual partners attached. This is nothing new. There are more than enough enablers and lackeys in the executive ranks that encourage this. Again, this is nothing new. Absolute power corrupts absolutely.
What is a potential problem for HP is that their CEO lied on his expense reports. He can be held liable for this under SOX, and therefore, can be charged and sent to jail. Anyone that helped him gets charged too.
The SEC would prosecute something like this because it makes the news and makes them look like they are doing something, and it puts the screws to a disagreeable character. Meanwhile, for every Mark Hurd, there are 1,000 other C-levels that are doing much worse, and 10,000+ people that got screwed by companies that will never get justice for their plight because the SEC will focus their best and brightest on prosecuting someone over expense reports.
Sick fucks like this try to keep their positions for 10-20 years instead of giving others the opportunity to proceed with their careers and have his position.
Made enuf monnies anyways now i can apply :S
Is this really an OSNews type topic? IMHO it ought to be in the gossip columns rather than a serious (or used to be serious) column.
Regards,
Peter
Maybe, they’d rather talk about why Mark Papermaster left Apple.
I’m still thinking that it’s defective that all this “talent” can take away such a large severance package, especially for those who ruin a company, even if they can’t do it on their own.
Few mention the multimillion dollar golden handshake he received. For that money they can fire me any day for whatever f@#@ng reason.
Just some points here, normally companies’ don’t fire there execs even if they are coke sniffing LSD heads. As long as money rolls and the shareholders are happy.
I think HP and press might have been a bit unfair here.
1. He was cleared of sexual harassment.
In other words we had two consenting adults here.
2. She wasn’t even an HP employee.
3. It looks like the scorned woman case and maybe not even scorned just opportunistic.
In this specific case I think the lawsuit was frivolous and opportunistic and a shame for the gender equality in the workspace. Men to are frequently victims here.
This is the reason why so many execs hire men or old ladies for assistants these days.
From article…
… several other facts came to light that made Hurd’s position as CEO untenable; he “failed to disclose a close personal relationship he had with the contractor that constituted a conflict of interest, failed to maintain accurate expense reports, and misused company assets“.
He did not resign due to the lawsuit.
Edited 2010-08-08 11:32 UTC
According to other sources, the woman, Jodie Fisher, says they never had sex. And she is sorry he lost his job. She did receive money in a settlement, but how much is anyone’s guess. She and Hurd are being very tight lipped about the whole thing.