WASHINGTON – It’s not surprising that Hewlett-Packard has become the laughingstock of corporate America.
That often happens when a group of people are consumed by paranoia and behave like idiots.
There was, says a source very familiar with the company, “a wholesale preoccupation with leaks that predated the current scandal.”
Ousted Patricia Dunn has spent the last few weeks – her last ones, it turns out as H-P chairman – defending herself against a congressional inquiry and the snickers of reasonable people.
What H-P did was as stupid as it was silly – it went through people’s garbage, invaded the privacy of their phone records and even concocted a little drama featuring a fictional disgruntled employee named Jacob.
The purpose of the ruse was to find out who was leaking sensitive corporate information to the press.
All fingers now point to the leaker as George Keyworth, a longtime corporate director, who was either just a chatty old gent or someone with an agenda.
And more than one member of the House Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations yesterday likened H-P to the Keystone Kops as Dunn and CEO Mark Hurd squirmed.
“We have before us witnesses from Hewlett-Packard to discuss a plumbers’ operation that would make Richard Nixon blush were he still alive. And calling folks who did this, or allowed this, Keystone Kops, is an insult to the original Keystone Kops.”
Dunn swears she didn’t do anything wrong. All she did was ask that someone find out who was telling tales to the media.
Never, ever would she have authorized such an invasion of privacy. Besides, she said, she really wasn’t all that powerful as chairman, a “non-executive” she said.
But Dunn – who came equipped with a massive press kit that included a CD – tried to deflect criticism from herself, telling the committee that Hurd might have actually known the extent of the probes.
At least Dunn had something to say. The first 10 witnesses that the committee called all suddenly took the Fifth Amendment against self-incrimination.