There has got to be more to the Mark Hurd story. I simply don't believe that he was fired over a several thousand dollar discrepancy on his expense reports. Let's go to the calculator!
If I remember correctly, Mark made about $20,000,000 per year. Let's assume 40 hours per week and 50 weeks per year to keep it simple:
$20,000,000/year / 50 weeks/year / 40 hours/week = $10,000/hour!!!
So, the HP board knowingly paid Mark $10,000 per hour, yet they're willing to make a big stink, and allow their stock to tank, over what amounts to a couple hours worth of Mark's time? After he had offered to pay it back? Hmmm...something doesn't add up here, and it's not my math.
I suppose I could be magnanimous and assume that the board is just so ethically principled that the amount of money involved was irrelevant in light of the violations of HP's Standards of Business Conduct. I know, I know. That is so absurd that I am embarrassed to have even written the words.
Whatever is going on here, I just hope the curtain doesn't get pulled back too soon. I want the California voters to be reminded of what great people ex-HP CEO's are, but not just yet.
I have been asking myself this same question. There has got to be more than has been revealed so far. Dan found this article that says much the same:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-08-09/the-hurd-mentality-hp-s-mark-hurd-and-the-big-traps-in-small-lapses.html
Juliana