Lessons Learned - The HP Way

Lessons Learned Episode 04: The HP Way

(See the bottom of this blog post to follow the whole "Lessons Learned" series.)

In October 1995, I left my last real job and entered the world of consulting as an independent contractor. After much research and many interviews, I signed a contract to become the outsourced Site Manager for PC Software Support for HP's Roseville, California plant. "Roseville" had about 5,000 workers at the time. Between desktops and laptops, my team supported about 7,000 machines.

In addition to my (software support) team, there were separate teams for server support, network support, and hardware support. As a result, one of the challenges was to avoid finger-pointing and focus on getting users back up and running when there were problems.

My team was about twenty-five in total. I also managed the HP-UX (Unix) helpdesk, the onsite backup systems, and ran the memory cage. RAM was so expensive, and the price so volatile at the time, that we locked it into a cage the size of a small hotel room. The cage was filled with file cabinets filled with memory modules. Inventory was tightly controlled as the contents of the cage were worth millions of dollars. An employee was literally locked in the cage and had to be let out for breaks.

I learned a great deal working at HP. And I have many stories about personnel, certification, teamwork, and more. But four big lessons stand out: Hiring, The HP Way, work-life balance, and managing a very large service board.

Hire Slow

The process to get hired into this job took almost two months. Of course there was the formal application process. Then a series of interviews by a variety of different people, some from the agency who held the contract and some from the HP managers I would be working with. And then there was the salary negotiation.

If there's one thing you could guarantee about the process, it was their commitment to taking it slow and making the right decision. They even flew in some folks from another state for one interview. I felt comfortable that I was not settling in any way when we signed a deal. And they were confident that they had not settled in offering me the job.

The HP Way

If you haven't read The HP Way by David Packard, today's a good day to invest in this book. (Full title, The HP Way: How Bill Hewlett and I Built Our Company.)

I was vaguely aware of the "HP Way" before I got there. I had been buying and running HP servers, desktops, and HP3000 mini-computers for several years before I got there. And I was amazed, starting my first day on the job, how visible The HP Way was in the culture and daily operations.

Values expressed in the HP Way include:

• Belief in their people, and commitment to letting them do their jobs without interference
• Respect, dignity, and individual self-esteem
• Giving employees recognition and a sense of achievement
• Job security, and developing employee talents
• A team culture that people share benefits and responsibility, and help each other
• Informal, open communications
• A chance to learn by making mistakes, knowing your job is secure
• Training and education

... and more

For a fuller picture, see https://www.hpalumni.org/hp_way.htm.

Words are fine. But I'd seen meaningless words on the wall behind the worst boss I ever had. Corporations often go through lengthy processes to create meaningless documents that are never reflected in their operating culture. HP really was different (at least in the Fall of 1995).

One thing really stands out to me about meetings with managers and others on that job. You could absolutely and definitively assume that everyone in the room was qualified, and that they were among the best people in their field. Network engineers did not question the knowledge or skills of desktop support. The software team didn't second-guess the server team. And so forth. 

We discussed things, and sometimes disagreed. But everyone knew that everyone else was good at what they did, and shared the company commitments and values - or they wouldn't be in the room. It is truly amazing how much a sincere commitment to professionalism and open communication makes the job easier. You can admit when you don't know something, and you don't feel embarrassed or belittled when you defer to someone who knows more.

I had mostly operated along these lines as a manager, and tried to instill this independence and confidence in my employees. But now I got to experience how a major corporation operates on these principles everyday. It was wonderful.

Work/Life Balance

A great of example of how the HP Way worked its way into my division's operation was the commitment to work-life balance. This commitment was so prominent that it was on the footer of every document, every form, every hand-out, and every presentation slide. We value work-life balance. No commas. No exceptions. No parenthetical fine print. We value work-life balance.

As part of the culture, making this commitment so visible was reflected in daily and weekly behavior. If someone was on a break or at lunch, no one badgered them or made them feel guilty for not being a workaholic. We didn't schedule meetings after six. We didn't expect people to kill themselves logging sixty hours per week.

A great example of this was the need for special projects. Sometimes, due to the nature if the network configuration and the limitations of equipment at the time, people were asked to work on the weekend. Every single person was empowered to ask the question, "How does this square with our commitment to work-life balance?"

Anyone in the organization could to pick up just about any piece of paper, point to the footer, and ask, "How does this square with our commitment to work-life balance?" Sometimes the work was moved. Sometimes, people were allowed to opt out (without retribution). Whatever the response, there was an open discussion, and the planning included consideration of the commitment.

Of course, there were times when people needed to work a little extra. But no one was made to feel guilty or "not a team player" if they brought up the question of work-life balance. The team knew that they could count on this cultural value. And these exceptions were rare, not monthly or weekly, let alone daily.

Again, I had believed, but now I saw proof: Your commitment to your culture is visible in your actions. Every week. Every day. Every time. When your commitment to your values is visible, everyone sees it. And when they see a disconnect, that's just as obvious.

Many argue that Carly Fiorina killed the HP Way. You can Google it. I was not at HP when she took over.

Managing a Big Service Board

I had managed service in many forms by the time I got to HP. But I had not managed a service board with 5,000 users and 7,000 devices before. Plus, we had some major projects. For example, I was given the challenge of creating a remote workforce on the new Windows NT operating systems. This was stretching the limits of the COE - HP's Common Operating Environment. But that's another story.

Again, my team was about twenty-five fulltime technicians, many of them in their first real job. And there were thousands of tickets per month. We used a Remedy brand ticketing system, which was unbelievably powerful even in 1995. One of my first challenges was to get the backlog under control. I can honestly say that getting my arms around the open tickets, and getting our service delivery into compliance with our promised service levels, was one of the biggest jobs I've ever tackled.

But I had a great team who just didn't question where we were going or how we were going to get there. I developed a plan, documentation, and an implementation process. We had the double task of working all the new tickets in a timely manner and getting the backlog into compliance. And we did it in just a few months.

Literally everything I learned in that monster undertaking taught me how to manage a service board for any size business. When I developed similar procedures for my own IT businesses, they started with these "lessons learned" at HP. Even today, as a business coach, I have a well-defined process for "massaging your service board." 

In fact, that process found it's way into the Managed Services Operations Manual, AND I teach an entire class on it at IT Service Provider University. 

Executing the lessons learned at HP have helped me earn a lot of money in my IT business. And they continue to inform the teaching and coaching I do with other businesses. To be honest, I'm not sure where my career would be without this excellent experience.

Final Notes

I literally had to drive from one end of the county to another during rush hour every day to be at my desk at 8:00 AM. I allotted more than an hour for the drive. And I have a vivid memory of getting most of the way to work and saying to myself, "I LOVE this job!" I would literally say it out loud in the car.

Day after day, with few exceptions, I said those words as I drove to work. In part, this was the "rebound" job after having the worst boss ever. But it was also just a great job with great people and a great culture. I couldn't imagine a better job.

And then I met the best boss I ever had. I'll tell you about that in the next episode!

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