by Jonathan Gifford | Jan 22, 2010 | Business & Leadership
Carly Fiorina and the HP Compaq merger In September 2001, Hewlett Packard’s gutsy new CEO, Carly Fiorina – ‘the most powerful woman in business,’ according to Fortune magazine in 1998 – announced the acquisition by Hewlett Packard of the major PC manufacturer,...
by Jonathan Gifford | Jan 9, 2010 | Leaders from History
I must confess that I have a bit of thing about Napoleon. A quick check on Amazon will show you (reassuringly, perhaps, for me) that I am not alone. There are a lot of books about Napoleon. If you are a student of leadership, then you come up against Napoleon like a...
by Jonathan Gifford | Nov 22, 2009 | Business & Leadership
One of the most disturbing things about getting older is that it creeps up on you. Things that seem fresh in the memory turn out to have happened decades earlier. John Harvey-Jones is a case in point for me. I remember his BBC TV series, Troubleshooter, very clearly....
by Jonathan Gifford | Nov 14, 2009 | Business & Leadership
In his book, Who Says Elephants Can’t Dance, Louis V Gerstner, Jr. says a rather moving and also very insightful thing about the psychology of being a Chief Executive Officer. Gerstner’s book includes his farewell letter to all staff, confirming his retirement. In it,...
by Jonathan Gifford | Nov 9, 2009 | Business & Leadership
When Carly Fiorina was employed as the CEO of Hewlett Packard in July 1999, her brief was clearly to bring about change. She soon decided that she and her top team were not merely ‘change agents’; what was needed were ‘change warriors’. So far, so macho. We must...
