Work Matters

Category: Leadership

  • Is It Sometimes Rational to Select Leaders Randomly? A Cool Old Study

    This term at Stanford, I am teaching a doctoral seminar on leadership.  Of course, this one of the broadest and most confusing topics on earth.  I am not qualified to teach a seminar on love or religion; so, for me, this is the most vexing topic I can teach.  The topic for the first meeting was "cynicism."  I started out by assigning academic papers that brought evidence and perspectives that undermined conventional assumptions about leadership and that even questioned why scholars bothered to study the topic at all (my friend and co-author Jeff Pfeffer raised this question in a 1977 paper called "The Ambiguity of Leadership").

    The most entertaining paper we read was by S. Alexander Haslam and a long list of coauthors, called  "Inspecting the emperor's clothes: evidence that random selection of leaders can enhance group performance" (Group Dynamics: Theory, Research, and Practice, Vol. 2, No. 3, 1998, pp. 168-184).  The two key studies in the paper entailed assigning student groups to play various versions of the "survival exercise" (see some of the variations here), where the group imagines that they have experienced some kind of disaster and are stranded (a plane crash, a broken car in the desert, and a nuclear war were used in these studies).  The group's task is to rank order the importance of a dozen or so items that might help them survive the ordeal (e.g., a compass, map,  loaded pistol, newspapers, cigarette lighter).  The performance of the group is determined by comparing their rank-ordering to those produced by experts.  This is, of course, just a simulation of reality.  But I've participated and led these exercises and they are quite engaging — I suspect many of you have had similar experiences. 

    Overall, the researchers compared the performance of these student groups under four conditions:

    1.  A leader selected via a formal selection process (self-ratings by group members)

    2. A leader selected by an informal process (group members had a discussion and picked a leader)

    3. A leader who was randomly selected.

    4. No leader selected. 

    The consistent finding was that groups with RANDOMLY selected members performed significantly better than groups in all other conditions, and there weren't significant differences found between the other conditions.  The researchers also did some follow-up surveys, and revealed some mildly interesting findings; notably, groups with randomly selected leaders rated their leaders as LESS effective even though their performance was BETTER.

    The authors assert that this rather surprising finding — which was fairly strong and replicated across two (albeit modest) studies — occurs because performance on this task requires cooperation, input, and effort from all group members.  They suggest that the very act of selecting one individual, of singling him or her out as better than the rest or simply focusing attention on that person, undermines the group's sense of unity and shared identity. They suggest that doing so may lead to social loafing.   As they put it, in describing the impact of a contest for the "best" leader:

      'In effect, their thoughts about the leader may have been of the form "if you're so wonderful, you can get on with it.' 

    I am still not entirely sure that these arguments are right, but I guess they make some sense (although they do not quite explain why groups that did not select leaders at all did equally badly — the researchers suggest this is because the leadership role is necessary).  Yet the study, imperfections aside, is provocative.  I like it because it challenges so many deeply held assumptions about groups and organizational life.  I especially like how it implies that just THE PROCESS of selecting the leader can provoke group dynamics that undermine the performance of the group as a whole.  That is worth considerable attention as this is something that selection committees and such often forget — and consistent with findings from many corners of the behavioral sciences that show "what you do is as important as how you do it."  Also, while the survival games probably do not generalize well to most tasks in organizational life, another possible implication is that, if you are doing a task where no one has any special expertise or experience, you might try randomly selecting your leader.

    What do you think? Does this have any implication in real life, or is it just one of those crazy studies that is irrelevant to real people and organizations?

    P.S. As veteran readers of this blog may remember, I have written about the virtues of randomness before; check out this post about Karl Weick's cool ideas about randomness and wisdom.

    P.P.S. Do not miss the link to the study from Arie below.  More evidence that randomly promoting people might work! Thanks Arie, fantastically weird.

     

  • 5 Warning Signs to Watch for at Apple

    I declined several media inquiries to comment on Steve Jobs and the impact his departure will have on Apple.  I did so because predicting the future of any company is always hard, but especially so for Apple where the secrecy is so severe.  For example, although Tim Cook has stepped in and out of the CEO role multiple times, the assumption seems to be that Jobs has retained influence on daily operations throughout the past three or four years. Clearly, Steve is quite sick and has been for a long time, which leads me to wonder to what extent Steve Jobs himself versus the IDEA of Steve Jobs has held stronger sway in Apple.  In any case, it is clear the Cook has been running a big proportion of day to day operations for years now.  But perhaps Jobs has had little more than symbolic influence for years.  If that is true — and I have no idea if it is — the odds that Apple will continue its impressive run might be a bit higher than pundits predict.  Regardless, in the short-term, my hunch is the capital markets have the right take on Apple (the stock is holding rock steady) as it has such great products, pizazz, stores, and operations that sudden trouble seems unlikely.

    When I finally did a media interview for FT Germany yesterday, I got to thinking about Apple from an organizational and cultural perspective.  I was especially influenced by Adam Lashinsky's magnificent Fortune piece called Inside Apple.  The story that emerges from Adam's piece and other bits of information is that Apple's structure, work practices, and beliefs about how to get done are woven together to support a highly centralized model of decision-making, where very talented individuals and small teams are given specific tasks, individuals are held highly accountable for implementation, and extremely strong cultural, interpersonal, and performance pressures are present. 

    Although I won't dig into the debate about trade-offs between centralization and decentralization, centralization works best when leaders face a relatively small number of important decisions, when they find ways to reduce the emotional and cognitive load on the relatively small number of people making major decisions, and tight personal, organizational, and cultural controls mean that decisions from on high are implemented quickly and without much question.  At its best, in a centralized system, there is much confidence in leaders, fast communication up and down, and relatively little time spent on dysfunctional politics (as there is no power vacuum, little second guessing, and severe penalties for ignoring or undermining orders from on high).   Although it is mighty hard to know exactly what is going on in Apple, this description seems to fit most stories and other information about the place under the shared leadership of Jobs and Cook. 

    Assuming this is more or less accurate, I started wondering, what would be some signs that such a system was heading for trouble? Consider five:

    1. The size of the board of directors starts to grow.  Apple has been criticized for having a board that is too small, only 7 people.  Smaller teams not only make better and faster decisions, and have better dynamics, a small board helps a senior management team move faster as there are fewer masters to serve and, on average, the speed and quality of their advice should be better.  If more members are added to Apple's board (especially if they get to 10 or more) it would suggest the board and top team are putting too many things on their plate, trying to please too many masters, and creating more complex group dynamics that will slow and complicate decision-making and implementation in both groups. 

    2. The number of products expands dramatically.  When Jobs first returned to Apple, they had a huge pile of products — he killed all of them within the year.  For example, as Jobs said ten months after his return, they had so many different kinds of Macs and other hardware that Apple employees couldn't even tell their friends which ones to buy (See this old 1998 video, especially minute 5:20 to 7:30 or so).  In contrast, look at the product line now, they only make one iPhone at a time, one iPad, and have a pretty narrow set of Macs too.  If you are going to run a highly centralized organization (as one friend of mine calls it "genius driven"), a smaller product line is especially important because, that way, the senior team need only track a relatively small number, which averts placing excessive cognitive load on them.  As I wrote here earlier, Jobs has argued that a hallmark of great companies is that they not only kill all the bad ideas, they kill most of the good ones too so they can focus on doing a few things well and not design inelegant products or experiences that reflect an effort to jam every seemingly good idea in someplace.

    If Apple's product line gets bigger, especially a lot bigger, it gets harder to run the organization without delegating more major decisions.  In addition, and perhaps most crucially, when an organization has an irrationally large product line, when consumers and even insiders can't understand the logic, the real explanation often is that there are many medium power groups that have enough resources and influence to build their own hardware, software, or whatever BUT not enough power to stop others.  As a result, many medium size fiefdoms emerge, attention turns inwards to gaining political advantage over competitors, and away from what is best for the company and customers.  I saw this at GM before the bankruptcy.  This was also exactly the situation that Jobs faced when he returned to run Apple in the mid 1990s. My conversations with Apple insiders suggest that dysfunctional politics explained the big product line, not the strategy.  So a big increase in products — and one that doesn't seem to make much sense — would signal the team is putting too much cognitive load  on itself, moving to a more decentralized model that does not fit with other elements of Apple, and that people are spending more time battling to get THEIR product out and to kill others developed by colleagues instead of making a few INSANELY GREAT products.

    3. Departures of senior executives.  One of the most consistent strengths of Apple that observers emphasize is the quality of their top team.  The same goes for their board too, with perhaps the star being the amazing Bill Campbell, one of the most renowned coaches and mentors on the planet and THE most desirable board member in Silicon Valley. Presumably, Tim Cook has had years to work with them, and the dynamics are healthy; I suspect one reason Apple is so effective partly is because of this stability.  When people start leaving any group, there is good evidence that the resulting disruption undermines group performance as it takes time for groups to absorb and learn how to work with new people.  I would be especially concerned if people who left are replaced by outsiders, as Apple clearly has distinct ways of thinking and acting that would take time for even the most able outsider to learn.  Moreover, when people start leaving a top management team at unexpectedly high rates, it often signals trouble: They are unhappy with their CEO and fellow executives, they are being forced out, or both. Note that there have been some key departures of senior executives  in recent months, so this is something to keep an eye on.  In particular, if head designer Jonathan Ive left, that would signal that something is terribly wrong.

    4. Leaks to the press.  As an outsider who would like to know more about Apple, and who often talks to journalists that cover Apple, the difficulty of learning anything about the company just amazes me.  It took me a good four months to confirm that my former Stanford colleague Joel Podolny had become head of HR after hearing the first rumor it had occurred — and of course Joel was too smart and well-socialized to answer the email I sent him asking him if the rumor was true.  While information does sometimes get out (consider Adam Lashinsky's great Fortune piece) a hallmark of Apple's culture is that people in the company take secrecy so seriously — especially when it comes to forthcoming products and release dates (the current secrecy around the iPhone 5 being a case in point).  I have friends who work at Apple, not just Joel.  It is amazing to see what happens to them when they go to work there.. they stop talking, they won't return emails, and you learn — if you do run into them — not to ask them about anything sensitive.  After all, should they slip and tell you, they are putting their own jobs at risk.  Now, such paranoia, although unattractive in some ways, does have advantages in that competitors are kept in the dark and consumers don't really know when an Apple product they buy will be outdated.  Apple has been able to do an especially brilliant job of tweaking production levels (thanks to Tim Cook's amazing supply chain) and pricing so they can squeeze the most out of existing but soon to be outdated hardware and software.  Perhaps even more important, Apple's infamously effective secrecy is a sign of fantastic cultural control and individual commitment to the company. If we start seeing more leaks than in the past, it signals the strength of the bonds among people are weakening and their fear of breaking this most sacred of Apple commandments in waning — that Apple's carrots and sticks aren't working as well as in the past.

    5. Acquisitions, especially big ones.  Just this morning, I was reading some stories quoting management professors who predicted that Apple is sitting on so much money that they would probably go on a shopping spree and buy a bunch of companies.  If this happens, I would really start to worry.  Yes, small strategic acquisitions to bring specific people or specific technologies that Apple needs to move ahead are probably necessary and wise.  But if you look at research on acquisitions, especially big acquisitions, not only do they tend to fail, they do a bunch of things to organizations (especially senior teams) that would be especially deadly for Apple.  They distract leaders from the day to day operations of their firms, increase the overall cognitive and emotional load, bring in different and change resistant subcultures that are usually harder to transform than senior executives predict, they result in additions (and subtractions) to the top management team and board of directors (and thus create the group dynamics problems outlined earlier), and often broaden the product line (The Compaq/HP merger being a case in point).  As such, it seems to me that doing a big acquisition — or worse yet, a stream of them — would be an especially efficient way to undermine Apple's seemingly magnificent structure and culture.  Apple got big by doing a fairly small number of things very well and by doing them for themselves.

    As I said at the outset, it is impossible to predict Apple's fate.  I would speculate, however, that regardless of whether all or none of the things above happen, the best bet is that Apple will slip a bit in the next decade.   One reason is simply regression to the mean, that things even out over time, so extreme outliers in any distribution tend to drift toward the average.   There are some forces that helps this process along in very successful companies.  As my colleague Jeff Pfeffer likes to say, whether it comes to a great restaurant or a great technology company, the inevitable distractions, overload, outside scrutiny,  arrogance, confusion, and fear of screwing things up (rather than focusing on making things better and better) mean, all too often, that "success ruins everything."   Regardless, regression to the mean seems to happen in most or all systems where large variance in performance is seen.  Certainly every high flying technology company that ever existed has eventually drifted toward the middle or bottom, at least for awhile.   Even the most enduring, such as IBM, have gone through some hard times and, of course, Apple had some mighty tough times in the mid 1990s. 

    Meanwhile, I confess that I hope Apple continues to be great and become greater.  If the iPhone 5 is as cool as I hope, I will get one.   My old 3GS is still running strong, but I don't think I will be able to resist.  About a year ago, I had dinner with design guru Don Norman , who was once a senior executive running advanced development at Apple,  Don was quickly fired when Jobs returned.   Don, who is smart, charming, and has a sharp tongue, noted that Jobs' decision was understandable, he just wished that Steve had been a little nicer about it.  Don — who owns both a Droid and iPhone — made an interesting comment.  That you could argue all day about the technical pros and cons of each phone, but he pretty much always grabs the iPhone because it is just more fun and that "fun thing"  is a reflection of Steve Jobs' and Jonathan Ive's combined genius: Something no other technology company seems to ever figure out quite so well or so consistently.   If Apple can protect and keep spreading that human magic across its products, and keep running that amazing supply chain, nothing that any of us say will matter.  Their greatness will persist.

  • The Progress Principle: A Masterpiece Every Manager Should Own

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    The Progress Principle was just published. A big congratulations to Teresa Amabile and Steven Kramer.  I love this book, it is based on incredibly rigorous research, it provides the the best evidence ever of the power of small wins (one of my obsessions in Good Boss, Bad Boss), and it is chock full of useful advice that every executive, manager, and team member needs to do better work and to take more pleasure from the process of doing work.  My advice is to simply buy the book.  But if you want a few more details, here is a review I just did at Amazon because I got excited all over again when I started re-reading the book:

    I read an advance copy of The Progress Principle several months back, and I just went back and read the book again. I am even more impressed this time than the last. Four things struck me in particular:

    1. While most management books are based on anecdotes, the biased recollections of some famous executives, or on research that is presented as rigorous (but is not… Good to Great is a perfect example), the Progress Principle is based on the most rigorous field study ever done of creative work. And it draws on other rigorous work as well. As a result, the overall advice about the importance of small wins may be known to many people, but once you start digging into the smaller bits of advice about how to keep work moving along, the evidence behind those is very strong. In my view, the Progress Principle is the best example of an evidence-based management book I have ever seen.

    2. The authors didn't drown in their rigor and the details of their work. They worked absurdly hard to write a book that is quite engaging to read and chock full with one implication after another about what you can do right now to do more effective work and to motivate it in the people around you.

    3. Finally, the main point of this book may seem obvious to some readers, but if you listen to most management gurus and fancy consulting firms, the approach that the authors suggest is actually radically different. The broad sweep of strategy and radical change and big hairy goals is where much of modern management advice focuses, yet the finding from this book that it is relentless attention to the little things and the seemingly trivial moments in organizational life that really makes for greatness is not something that most leaders and their advisers get, yet it is the hallmark of our most creative companies like Pixar, Apple, Google, IDEO and the like. The implication of The Progress Principle, for example, that management training should focus on how to deal with the little interactions and smallest decisions — and that is what makes for great leaders and organizations — would, if taken seriously, mean completely revamping the way that management is taught throughout the world.

    This book isn't a bag of breathless hype, it doesn't make grand and shocking claims, and it doesn't promise instant results. But it is fun and easy to read, it is as strongly grounded in evidence as any business book ever written, and it is relentlessly useful because it points to little things that managers, team members, and everyone else can do day after day to spark creativity and well-being. And it shows how those little things add-up to big victories in the end. I believe it is one of the most important business books ever written.

    In the name of full disclosure, I am friends with the authors and did endorse the book. But I am friends with a lot of authors, but when they write bad books, I decline endorsement requests, and as I did very recently, let them know that I think their books aren't very good. Yes, I am biased, but I believe that this book deserves to be a #1 bestseller.

    P.S.  A special request to you, dear readers.  If you love the Progress Principle as much as I do, please do a little something to get the word out about the book — an Amazon review, a blog post, a tweet, or tell a friend.  The authors are working hard to get the word out, but they don't have a huge marketing machine or giant budget behind them, all they have is a great book. 

  • A Talk On Fast Innovation, All In One Great Picture

    A couple weeks ago, I did a talk on "fast innovation" at IDEO.  I gave the talk from a powerpoint deck, but at the same time, while the audience and I discussed the the talk, there was a guy named Kevin Bain who does this thing called
    "graphics scribing."  On a single big piece of paper, he drew images and a few words that summarized the main points.  This is the the third or fourth time I have worked with one of these scribes.  When they are good, like Kevin is, the interaction with the audience unfolds in an interesting and better way than a standard talk.  You see the main points unfolding all on one piece of paper, every now and then the scribe will stop and summarize what he or she has been recording so the group gets a sense of where it has been, and at the end, you've got a cool summary of the talk for the group that is all on one place. 

    It is hard to see the details of the picture below, but if you click on it, you can see a bigger version that is easy to read. Regular readers of this blog and my books will recognize some of my standard themes, like creativity being about doing new things with old things, small wins, and the smart-talk trap.  But I have never seen them put together quite like this, and while "you had to be there" to understand the full context, I am still rather amazed and humbled what a great job he did summarizing core ideas that have taken years for my co-authors and me to develop.  Kevin's website is here if you want to see a few more samples and to contact him about his "graphic facilitation" services.

     

    Bob sutton_innovation_scribing

  • Caffeine: It Undermines Performance on Collaborative Tasks for Men, Enhances It For Women

    I can't believe that I missed this study reported by BPS research last January.  Way cool.  It compared the performance of men working in pairs to women working pairs.  The researchers placed them under performance pressure, and varied whether they drank caffeinated or decaffeinated coffee.   The "caffeinated" men performed worse, while the women performed better.  Here is the opening paragraph from BPS, which suggested that the stimulant has these varying effects because, when cranked-up physiologically, people tend towered their most natural and well-rehearsed behavior — which means that men get more aggressive and women become more collaborative:

    If a meeting becomes stressful, does it help, or make things worse, if team members drink lots of coffee? A study by Lindsay St. Claire and colleagues that set out to answer this question has uncovered an unexpected sex difference. For two men collaborating or negotiating under stressful circumstances, caffeine consumption was bad news, undermining their performance and confidence. By contrast, for pairs of women, drinking caffeine often had a beneficial effect on these same factors. The researchers can't be sure, but they think the differential effect of caffeine on men and women may have to do with the fact that women tend to respond to stress in a collaborative, mutually protective style (known as 'tend and befriend') whereas men usually exhibit a fight or flight response.

    Clearly, this is a "more research is needed" situation.  But, if it generalizes to real life, the implication is that, if you are running a meeting and it is attended by all women, give them caffeinated drinks, but if it is all men, or perhaps a blend of men and women, given them the decaf if you want cooperation and better performance.  

    Here is the reference:

    St. Claire, L., Hayward, R., and Rogers, P. (2010). Interactive Effects of Caffeine Consumption and Stressful Circumstances on Components of Stress: Caffeine Makes Men Less, But Women More Effective as Partners Under Stress. Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 40 (12), 3106-3129 DOI:

  • A Cool Neurological Explanation for the Power of Small Wins

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    Regular readers of this blog know that I am a huge fan of the power of small wins, and following Karl Weick's classic article, have argued in Good Boss, Bad Boss and here at HBR that big hairy goals cause people to freak-out and freeze-up if they aren't broken down into smaller stepping stones. Small wins are also a big theme in Peter Sims great book Little Bets, which I wrote about last week. Well, today I learned about a cool article in CIO about a book by Shawn Achor called The Happiness Advantage: The Seven Principles of Positive Psychology that Fuel Success and Performance at Work.

    Check-out the article. I liked it a lot, notably the 20 Second Rule "To break a bad habit, add 20 seconds to the time it takes to engage in that bad habit." But my favorite part was his neurological explanation for the power of small wins and dangers of big hairy goals alone:

    Goals that are too big paralyze you. They literally shut off your brain, says Achor. Here's what happens to your brain when faced with a daunting goal or project:

    The amygdala, the part of the brain that responds to fear and threats, hijacks the "thinker" part of the brain, the prefrontal cortex, says Achor. The amygdala steals resources from the prefrontal cortex, the creative part of the brain that makes decisions and sees possibilities.

    "We watch this on a brain scan," he says. "The more the amygdala lights up, the less the prefrontal cortex does."Breaking a big goal into smaller, more achievable goals prevents the fear part of your brain from hijacking your thinking cap and gives you victories.

    Pretty cool, huh?  I have not read Shawn's book, but it sounds cool. Bosses beware, setting those big goals without breaking them into bite-sized people (or allowing and encouraging your followers to do so) will make you and your people dumb and uncreative — at least if Shawn is right. 

     

     

  • Little Bets: Peter Sims’ Delightful Masterpiece is Shipping

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    About 11,000 business books a year are published. Most of them aren't worth reading, either because you've heard it all before, they are badly written, not especially useful, and — perhaps the most common flaw — they are just no fun to read.  But, even though they are business books, there are always a few gems that you owe it to yourself to read.  Peter Sims Little Bets is one of those rarities.  I was blown away when I was asked to write blurb for the book, as I wrote:

    “Peter Sims buries the myth that big talkers with brains and big ideas move industry and science forward. This modern masterpiece demonstrates that the most powerful and profitable ideas are produced by persistent people who mess with lots of little ideas and keep muddling forward until they get it right. Little Bets is easily the most delightful and useful innovation book published in the last decade.”

    As the book is now out, I  took some time to visit with it again this morning –  I remain impressed.  Ye3s, Peter is a friend of mine, but most of my friends don't write books this compelling.  The first thing that struck me was the power of Peter's writing voice.  He exudes curiosity and optimism, which as I read the pages, provoked a feeling of joy that I've hardly ever experienced when reading a business book — I guess for me, Orbiting the Giant Hairball and The Art of Innovation had this effect, but it does not happen often.

     The second thing that struck me was the range of examples and the deftness with which Peter applies them to make points about small bets and in his lovely chapters (I especially like "Problems are the New Solutions" and "Questions are the New Answers.")  He uses everything from Chris Rock, to architect Frank Geary, to Pixar's Ed Catmull, to a U.S. Army General in Iraq, and many others.  He does this with such skill that I occasionally had to stop and admire how he had written a sentence or paragraph — I struggle to do this kind of thing day after day,it is a lot harder than it looks.

    Third, although Small Bets has many twists and turns, perhaps the core idea is the power of small wins, Karl Weick's powerful concept.  This is a message that comes through in other business books (including Good Boss, Bad Boss — see this post –  and in at least one other forthcoming business book I just read called The Progress Principle by Teresa Amabile and Steven Kramer).  The power of small wins is not only supported by strong empirical research, it provides an antidote, and at times a useful companion, to all the management theorists who spew out stories of big hairy goals, bold vision, exciting futures, and all that without providing resources or specifying just what people need to do day after day to achieve such magnificent ends.  Little Bets is so useful to read because it shows, on page after page, what you can do and how to think day after day about things like problems, solutions, failure, and fun to make great things happen. 

    I could go on and on… but you would be better off using your time reading the book than reading more of my words about it!

    P.S. You might also want to check out Peter's website.

  • Funny Humility From Groupon’s CEO

    Julia Kirby, the amazing editor from HBR, who among many other things, made The No Asshole Rule possible, just sent me this great note about a Forbes story on Groupon CEO Andrew Mason:

    The money quote from Groupon's CEO: "Most CEOs will make stuff up about themselves to sound way smarter and cooler and people are disappointed to find out otherwise. I decided to set the bar very low and make up lies about myself that make me sound lame.”

    Very refreshing! Not a bad life strategy — there is an argument for delivering more than you promise, and this is a rather intriguing strategy for making that happen!

  • Hope for HP’s Culture

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    The histories of the Stanford School of Engineering (where I work) and HP are closely intertwined.  Most famously, when Bill Hewlett and David Packard were young guys, they borrowed $500 from Fred Terman, then Dean of the school, to start the company.   There are at least three buildings in the Engineering School donated by Bill and Dave.  Appropriately,  they are the Terman building, the Hewlett building, and the Packard building. 

    The events over the past decade or so have led this once beautiful relationship to dim — nothing nasty has happened, it has just sort of faded along with the decline of HP's once vibrant innovative and humane spirit.   Carly Fiorina got so mad at the Hewlett & Packard foundations that she changed the name of the company from Hewlett-Packard to HP — because these foundations opposed the merger she led between Compaq and HP.  This dimmed the company's links to its founders, and indirectly, to Stanford.  Moreover, the Compaq merger brought in many executives with no geographical or emotional ties to Stanford.  The ties really faded under the Mark Hurd era as he had little emotional connection to Stanford, did major acquisitions like EDS in Texas that further scattered HP's geographical identity, and during his era of cost cutting, nastiness, and lack of emphasis on innovation, HP further lost its soul. 

    I know many former HP executives, managers, and engineers and this is the exact phrase the all seem to use to describe what happened. They talk about it almost as if it is a human death, uniformly emphasizing that the HP that exists today is not the company the worked for — many say they worked for Hewlett-Packard, not HP.  Moreover, when I came to Stanford, HP was THE employer of choice in Silicon Valley for Stanford Engineering students– it is now viewed as an employer of last resort by most students. 

    As such, I was delighted to see the honesty and ambition expressed by HP's new CEO, Leo Apotheker, in this report:

    “HP has lost its soul,” he said in an interview at Hewlett-Packard’s headquarters in Palo Alto, California, offering a glimpse of the vision he will outline in greater detail at an event on March 14 in San Francisco. “The first thing I wanted to do when I joined HP was listen to the people. The rank and file usually know about all the shortcomings.”

    This is a dramatic change in behavior. I love that he is telling the turth and using the same term that everyone else does to describe HP.   I wish Mr. Apotheker well and look forward to a day when, once again, the best and the brightest Stanford engineers are clamoring to work at HP.  Perhaps Mr. Apotheker should change the name of the company back to Hewlett-Packard.  Short of that, I suggest they remove the word  "Invent" from the company signage — see the above sign at company headquarters in Palo Alto. They use this logo and slogan on all their buildings.  As one former HP executive explained, once they put that word on the signs, she knew that HP's brilliant culture of innovation was fading fast. You don't see the word invent at Pixar, Apple, IDEO, or Facebook.   They don't need to talk about it because they do it and it runs deep in their souls.

    P.S. Check out Tom Stewart's great post at BNET on What HP's New Chief Needs Most.

  • Kurt Vonnnegut on “Having Enough” A Reminder From The No Asshole Rule

    Yesterday, I was talking to a pair of very smart and very ambitious friends.  As I told them, I am all for high performing teams, excellence in performance, and I love the restlessness that drives creative people at places like Apple, Pixar, and Facebook.  But there is a negative underbelly to this human drive toward achievement.  It can become a disease where, no matter how much some people get, they keep wanting more, and the result is not only chronic unhappiness for themselves and those around them, it is also often propels unethical and otherwise inhuman behavior. 

    The worst examples are seen in the power poisoning and associated delusions among the worst of political leaders, with Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi and his sons disgusting antics currently playing starring roles on the international stage.  But my focus has been on more mundane crimes against humanity.  In particular, if the charges are true, the insider trading and other unlawful actions taken by Galleon Group's  Raj Rajaratnam, whose trial just started, reflect a similar human flaw. Even more shocking to me is the news this week that Rajat Gupta — former board member at Procter & Gamble and at Goldman Sachs, and former Managing Director of McKinsey — was charged with insider trading.  Procter & Gamble and McKinsey are two firms I know pretty well, and while there is a strong focus on excellence in both places, I was troubled because — each in their own way — they are among the most ethical and non-greedy cultures I have ever encountered. 

    The fact that such a central player in both places fell victim to such apparent bad judgment and greed means, to me, that no matter how wonderful you may think you are as a human-bring,and no matter how good the people around you might be,  we are all at risk of falling prey to own greed, status insecurities, and that feeling that comes with power that "the rules are for the little people."   Apparently, part of Gupta's defense will be that, if he did leak inside information to Raj Rajaratnam, he personally did not benefit financially (See this New York Times column).  To me, this defense is meaningless — at least from a moral perspective –  because it simply suggests that Gupta was trying to get more status from Raj Rajaratnam, pay back some old favor, or set the stage for a future one — all signs of greed (and perhaps some insecurity too — often a hallmark of very successful people).

    The lesson for all of us, as I emphasized in The No Asshole Rule, is that sometimes it can be remarkably useful to tell yourself "I have enough."  Here is an excerpt from a longer post I put-up in early 2007 on the official publication day of The No Asshole.  Current events suggest that this lesson from the late Kurt Vonnegut  is worth bringing it out again (I edited it lightly for clarity):

    The process of writing The No Asshole Rule entailed many fun twists and turns.  But the very best thing happened when I wrote for permission to reprint a Kurt Vonnegut poem called "Joe Heller," which was published in The New Yorker.  I was hoping that Vonnegut would give me permission to print it in the book, both because I love the poem (more on that later), and Vonnegut is one my heroes.  His books including Slaughterhouse Five and Breakfast of Champions had a huge effect on me when I was a teenager– both the ideas and the writing style.

    I wrote some anonymous New Yorker address to ask permission to reprint the poem, and to my amazement, I received a personal reply from Vonnegut about two weeks later (see it here).  The postcard he sent me was not only in his handwriting. He gave me permission to use the poem "however you please without compensation or further notice to me."  It remains one of my favorite things.

    The poem fits well in my chapter on how to avoid catching asshole poisoning.  Here is how I set it up in the book:

    'If you read or watch TV programs about business or sports, you often see the world framed as place where everyone wants “more more more” for “me me me,” every minute in every way. The old bumper sticker sums it up: “Whoever dies with the most toys wins.” The potent but usually unstated message is that we are all trapped in a life-long contest where people can never get enough money, prestige, victories, cool stuff, beauty, or sex – and that we do want and should want more goodies than everyone else.

    This attitude fuels a quest for constant improvement that has a big upside, leading to everything from more beautiful athletic and artistic performances, to more elegant and functional products, to better surgical procedures and medicines, to more effective and humane organizations. Yet when taken too far, this blend of constant dissatisfaction, unquenchable desires, and overbearing competitiveness can damage your mental health. It can lead you to treat those “below” you as inferior creatures who are worthy of your disdain and people "above" you who have more stuff and status as objects of envy and jealousy.

    Again, a bit of framing can help. Tell yourself, “I have enough.” Certainly, some people need more than they have, as many people on earth still need a safe place to live, enough good food to eat, and other necessities. But too many of us are never satisfied and feel constantly slighted, even though – by objective standards – we have all we need to live a good life. I got this idea from a lovely little poem that Kurt Vonnegut published in The New Yorker called “Joe Heller,” which was about the author of the renowned World War II novel Catch 22. As you can see, the poem describes a party that Heller and Vonnegut attended at a billionaire’s house. Heller remarks to Vonnegut that he has something that the billionaire can never have, "The knowledge that I've got enough." These wise words provide a frame that can help you be at peace with yourself and to treat those around you with affection and respect:

    Joe Heller  

    True story, Word of Honor:
    Joseph Heller, an important and funny writer
    now dead,
    and I were at a party given by a billionaire
    on Shelter Island.

    I said, "Joe, how does it make you feel
    to know that our host only yesterday
    may have made more money
    than your novel 'Catch-22'
    has earned in its entire history?"
    And Joe said, "I've got something he can never have."
    And I said, "What on earth could that be, Joe?"
    And Joe said, "The knowledge that I've got enough."
    Not bad! Rest in peace!"

    –Kurt Vonnegut

    The New Yorker, May 16th, 2005

    (Reprinted with Kurt Vonnegut’s permission)

    To return to Rajat Gupta, if the charges against him are true, it might have spared him and his former colleagues much pain if he had repeated  "I have enough"  to himself over and and over again at key moments.  While this lesson may come too late for him, it isn't for many of us.