Analysis of the firm’s changing environment
Discuss about the Leadership Style of Hewlett-Packard.
Hewlett-Packard, intends to fulfil all the responsibilities that are related to the development off the organization (Larker and Tayan 2011). Hiring CEO from the external source can be stated a major part of one of those strategies. The strategies have been distilled down to the evaluation and the approval of the corporate strategy and the hiring and terminating the CEOs from the organization. The aim of the report is to analyse the leadership styles that has been followed during the tenure of all the CEOs. All the CEOs who were hired from the external sources landed up in dethroning the revenue of the company. The point that has to be considered in this light is the responsibilities of the board of directors in the approval of their formation of the corporate social responsibility and the selection of the CEO in order to execute those strategies. The objective of the report is to understand the fact whether the board of HP has settled on the corporate social strategy. It further recognizes the leadership style that should have followed.
The report follows a specific method to address the study. In the first section the report consist of the changing environment of the firm. The firm undergoes the problem of changed leadership style of different CEOs that were appointed as well as fired at different intervals. The employees were found to be uncomfortable with the massive changes that occurred due to this change. In the next section the report discusses the capacity to respond to those changes. In the next section the report analyses the options that an individual can avail. In other worlds the options at disposal are discussed in the report. The final section of the report consists of the recommendations. The recommendation would include those factors that I would implement if I was made the CEO of the company. The recommendation would include the factor that would judge the alternative way out of the issues. This would also include the reason of choosing one particular alternative above the existing one (Larcker and Tayan 2015).
The environment of the firm was changed when the board decided to recruit as well as terminate the CEOs. With the change of the CEOs, the environment of the firm got changed in terms of the production of the company as well as the acceptance of them by the employees of the company. In order to understand the changing environment the leadership or the developmental strategy of each CEO have to be analysed. The company initially took the decision of recruiting Carly Florina as their CEO. She was the senior executive of Lucent Technologies before this. This was a striking change as the company recruited an external CEO for the first time. Moreover she had no idea of engineering. She had no experience of managing the team of the size of HP. Florida made plans to reenergize the company. She introduced the individual performance-based compensation plan in order to lay all the focus on the individual performance. She redesigned the sales and marketing function of the company. The remarkable decision that was taken by her was the decision of cracking a deal in order to acquire Compaq computer for 25 billion in stock. This step was taken in order to take the company ahead of its existing position. The change was however not a positive one. This turned out to be a loss for the company. This was the reason the committee of the board members had to ask her to resign (Beyer, Larcker and Tayan 2014).
Capacity to respond to the changes
After her Mark Hurd came into the position of CEO. It was after his resignation that the real reason of his resignation was leaked. The contractor of the company accused him of sexual harassment. In order to bring a change an abrupt resignation was given. It had the chance to cause damage to the shareholders. In losing Hurd the company posed threat to their shareholders, employees, customers and the partners. The board was split into six to four segments (Andersen and Ross 2014).
Leo Apotheker was the next appointed CEO of the company. During his tenure the stock of the company declined. The investors were dissatisfied with this. This made the board of directors to terminate him.
The next CEO of the company was Meg Whitman. He was the director before this. She had no experience of managing the company of HP’s size earlier. The investors were found to be puzzled and dissatisfied with the sudden news of appointment.
The continuous change of the CEOs had a negative impact on the employees of the organization. In case of Carly Fiorina, the employees thought the changes was too much and they found it to be difficult to abide by all the changes. She tried to change the structure of the company. The decision of acquiring the stocks of Compaq computer changed the entire environment of revenue of the company. It did not turn out to be a transformative event. From a figure of 0.9 percent it came to the figure of 0. 1 percent. The earnings report of the company was not impressive and therefore it was turned out to be an undesirable one. The company had no larger capacity to bear the further loss in the revenue and this is the reason she was asked to resign. With the resignation of Fiorina the board gave the explanation that the board is firmly committed to the business strategy that is in place. The board members were not ruling strategy related to the corporate structure and leadership. While Hurd resigned of being accused of sexual harassment, this was held to be an abrupt resignation. The shareholders could not accept this. The others however believed that he could not be trusted and therefore he could not be kept any longer in the board. The organization lacked a proper leadership style. The employees of the organization could not get a proper style of leadership. The appointment of Whitman as the next CEO made the investment committee confused. The board was reluctant to make any kind of pretexting. The board made no efforts to develop the internal as well as the external factors. The negative reaction of the investors, the shareholders brought about no change in the attitude of the board (Plattner, Meinel and Leifer 2015).
Various options at disposal
The three different CEOs produced three different leadership style. Carly did not know the structure of the company and she implemented changes that were related to the structure of the company. She followed the autocratic leadership. This is the reason the employees could not accept the ways of Carly. She should have followed the transformational leadership style. She should have sat with the team and the employees and should have even taken consider their views before taken a big decision. He took a big decision of the acquisition of the leading computer stock. She should have taken the opinion of the board members and the employees in case of the acquisition (Leeson 2016). This is the reason this move is stated as unruly. The employees accused her of not understanding the culture of the organization and taking decisions. She did not believe in taking opinion and as a result she had to resign as her decision turned out to be major loss for the organization. On the Mark Hurd completely lacked all the qualities of corporate strategy and leadership. A leader is expected to keep the internal environment comfortable. He was accused of sexual harassment. He broke all the expected norms of being a leader. He resigned in a sudden way. This gave rise to a controversy inside the company. This way of resigning was termed as the most reckless way of making change. He did left the company to face the damage. This made him no good leader. Apart from this, Meg Whitman, who was the next CEO adopted the process of following the existing strategy of the company. He failed to bring an innovation in the strategy. The board was reluctant on conducting the research outside. It was required for them to do it in a proactive manner. They showed no interest in bringing a positive change in the organization. The board should have formulated strategies in order to hire an effective CEO who would be transformational in his approach (Cifuentes-Férez 2014).
If I were the CEO of HP I would form a strong team of board members that is not present in the company. I would form innovative strategies that would develop the structure of the organization. All the decisions should be taken by taking an opinion of the board members. This will make the board of members positive about their approach. The existing board members of the organization are not proactive to do their job. They lack in the formation of organizational strategy. This is the reason they changed four CEOs. This is not healthy for any organization. The organization gets used to the ways of their leaders but if the leader keeps on changing they find it difficult to adjust with the ways of leadership. As a CEO I would make the change related to the development of the staffs and the employees. They form major part of the organization. This is the reason certain strategies like staff motivation and staff training and seminars should be arranged in order to develop the internal environment of the organization. The final and the most important factor that I would implement as a CEO is the implementation of proper ethics and policies that would preserve the dignity of the workers who are working inside the organization.
References
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