Atlas Shrugged

Summary

I read Ann Rand’s novel, the Fountain Head, in High School and loved it. I had intended to go on and read the book she wrote after that, Atlas Shrugged, but just never got around to it. However, I never stopped thinking that the title was just so perfect. It’s so evocative. Two words that encapsulated so much and presented such a clear image in the mind’s eye. A giant colossus stands with the world held steady on his tremendous shoulders. Beads of sweat on his face. The strain in his body palpable. Then, without warning, the strain becomes too much. He shrugs, and the stability of the world he balanced on his shoulders is forever shattered. The Start of Our Tale In 1993 I joined Hewlett-Packard as a financial analyst working for Corporate Financial Reporting. Four years later I was on my 3rd role at HP working for HP’s General Counsel (Chief Lawyer) in the capacity of Senior Director responsible for IT and Finance Operations of HP’s Legal Department. At that time HP’s Legal Department included some 300 individuals and spent about $50M in outside counsel fees. It was essentially a mid-sized law firm inside a large company. The event in this story, I believe represents the start of the HP’s slide from greatness. A fall that resulted in multiple spinouts and splits over the course of a decade and a half. I further believe that this decline was not inevitable and first and foremost stems from what can only be termed a crisis of confidence. HP as Colossus When I joined HP there were three major business groups. The Test and Measurement business was the oldest part of HP. It went back to the founding of the company in the 1930’s. HP’s first product was an audio oscillator and one of their first customers was Walt Disney. Disney would go on to use these oscillators to test audio equipment in the 12 specially equipped theaters that were to show Fantasia in 1940. In 1966 HP entered the computer segment and this became the 2nd major business line that made up the company. The...