Yes, it is still titled "The HP Phenomenon: Innovation and Business Transformation." Several of you have asked, "when?" Most have stopped asking. But we expect Galleys relatively soon, and publication ostensibly is set for April 2009. We'll see.
HP provided a little excitement a few weeks ago, threatening to stop the book with some over-zealous PR types newly arrived from GE and EDS. First, they claimed we had a huge number of "inaccuracies" and they asked that we remove or fix all of them, while citing only one (which they had wrong). Hard to fix something you don't know is wrong.
Second, they claimed that we had used much confidential information without permission, again citing one table. And finally, they claimed that we had misappropriated the cover picture which is an HP Brand from HP Labs obviously stolen from them.
We were nonplussed, but our editor was ecstatic -- THIS will sell books!
Our answers included pointing out that their archivists have had the number of oscillators and the sales price for the original Disney sale wrong for 45 years, and they aren't interested in the "real numbers".
We sent this re the table: "The Annex B table that you refer to was given to us with a specific comment that it could be used, despite claims you might have heard since. As it turns out, we removed it from the book before turning in the final manuscript several weeks ago, primarily on the basis that it was redundant because the data is entirely in the public domain. The 1958 Annual Report and subsequent Annual Reports carry all of the data contained in that table except the years 1939-1948. A quick perusal of the HP History on your website today reveals that 1939, 1940, 1941, 1942, 1943, 1947, and 1948 revenues and employees are listed there, so only the financial data around the wartime peak and the trauma around HP’s first ‘downsizing’ is not readily available. And Bill and Dave put that into their own DVD history, and portions are in Dave’s autobiography."
With regard to the cover picture, our reply was: "The photo-quality image that you asked that we not use came to us from HP – specifically with the notation at the time that it would be wonderful to use for the front cover, but that HP would have to get permission from the San Jose Mercury-News as well. The initial permission came from the VP of HP Labs, Dick Lampman, and his PR person, Glenda Dasmalchi. I have assumed that they were proper representatives of HP Labs." Both of those individuals have of course since retired, and permission was not regranted!
I think they didn't like the final couple of chapters perhaps, which say that "maybe the HP Way ain't what it used to be". I can vouch for that!
So, they relented, asking merely that we say they didn't help in any way. We will make that perfectly clear! I must say that I am not impressed of late -- this administration is all about wringing costs out of the system, and NOT at all about innovation or any socially redeeming values that used to be hallmarks of the company.
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There is a blog about some material in the HP Book at http://hpphenom.blogspot.com/
It seems to me that there are not enough good books about the early days of important companies. Dealers of Lightning did a fairly accurate job portraying Xerox PARC during the decade I was there. That said, HP's REAL history is a story that needs to be told. I can't wait to read the book!
I certainly agree. But it is not easy to "gain admission" to the history of most of these companies, for various reasons. And those who were participants are not necessarily the best ones to write about them, even though outsiders are seldom equipped to do so very well either.
WRT to PARC, there is considerable debate actually about the harm or value that "Fumbling the Future" caused. Dealers was a much more balanced book, but even it focused primarily on the PC innovations and slighted the wide range of technologies that emerged. A followup chapter by Berkeley prof Henry Cheseborough helped re the longer term context for PARC, which I regard as one of the alltime best Research environments of the world.
Chuck, I am so glad you made that last comment about HP. I have used HP printers for so long that it made my brain stumble when I decided to switch. However, and you know this is true of me, I could not watch a CEO get $420M compensation for laying off 24K people. The corporate culture of so many large companies has changed. HP was an incredible company but I think it is, like many, fading into the archetypical behemoth of no cultural value. It seems that large companies cannot surrender to the simple concept that if we all win, the company wins. It is only smaller companies that pull together and try extraordinary human processes to survive.
Tarri, I couldn't agree more. While there are still lots of solid and wonderful folk at HP, it is not at all obvious that they are "in control". Or said differently, it is clear that they are not running the place as it was once. Too bad.
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