Six Years Later, The Problem at HP is Still the Board

 

Six years ago, I wrote a post on my blog in the wake of the departure of HP’s (HPQ) then-Chairman Pattie Dunn. �I said then that the problem then wasn’t Dunn, but HP’s board.

Since this post, Mark Hurd departed under a cloud, Leo Apotheker was hired and fired in less than a year. �What’s interesting, as I re-read the post is that 3 members of the 2006 board are still there today: Larry Babbio, Sari Baldauf, and John Hammergren.

They seem to have imparted the same kinds of dysfunctionality that permeated HP’s board back then to the newer members of this now UN-sized board of 14.

Here’s the post:

HP has been in the news for all the wrong reasons in the past 3 weeks. Our focus has gone away from the impressive rise in its stock price since Mark Hurd’s appointment as CEO; as quickly as Dell‘s stock price and corporate reputation has dropped, HP’s has risen.

We’ve�previously spoken out on how Hurd’s qualities as a leader have — in many ways — been the perfect antidote to the erstwhile Carly regime. And, yet, we’ve had to endure the titilating but disturbing news of the “pretexting” actions carried out down the line from the board’s decision to purge a “leak” from within their midst.

The mainstream press commentary on this whole sorry episode has focused primarily on either (1) the disregard for privacy exhibited by the board’s actions, (2) whether Dunn should have left sooner, or (3) the lack of a full apology by the board or Hurd to the events. However, little, if any, attention has been paid to the composition of the HP board itself — the entire group responsible for the actions that have drawn such criticism.

The fact is that the entire HP board deserves an overhaul after this mess. Nell Minow — corporate goverance critic — calls the board�“dysfunctional” and she’s rig! ht.

< p>Here’s a quick run-down of the players (from HP’s site):

Lawrence T. Babbio, Jr.