On McNealy departure: Where are the new leaders?
By Tom Foremski - April 25, 2006
Scott McNealy's departure from Sun Microsystems has been on the cards for more than a year. It will likely be just one of many departures by veteran Silicon Valley and other captains of the tech industry over the next year or two, as that generation moves into the grey zone of life.
Mr McNealy has a superb track record, and his executive team over the years has gone on to lead many other companies. But it is hard to preside over a company that is not growing as Sun used to grow: explosively.
I remember chatting with Ed Zander, about a year after he left Sun and he spoke about how tough it was to downsize a workforce, and the many difficult decisions that Sun would have to make to survive the longest downturn in Silicon Valley's history. When you've spent most of your time hiring like mad, and focused on staff loyalty, downsizing is an anathema.
Managing a company that is growing very quickly is a very different challenge from managing a company in today's very tough markets. It is a very different culture and it requires a cultural change that not every company can manage well.
Sun has a huge market and has large opportunities, it won't go away anytime soon, but it does need a boost in the arm. I've often said that a Sun and Hewlett-Packard merger looks good to me, with some very good synergies. And it would be an interesting play against IBM, a West Coast v East Coast rivalry that could play well.
Is Mr McNealy's departure and the subsequent head count reduction, estimated at 5,000 by financial analysts, a way to dress up Sun for an acquisition or merger?
And who else will depart for the green pastures of the golf course? Steve Ballmer over at MSFT has been a bit quiet, Ray Ozzie is on the ascendent, there might need to be some room made at the top...
Who will be next to go is less interesting than who will be in the ranks of the new leaders of Silicon Valley and the tech industry. To be honest, I don't see much of a leadership emerging yet; maybe it is under the radar, maybe the new leadership will be apparent when the new upstart companies emerge?
But will we have new upstart companies that can survive beyond five years before they are acquired? Is the game these days a case of scale? In which case, the giant sucking sound of GOOG, YHOO, ORCL, SAP, INTC, EBAY, etc will dominate the technology/media world. And thousands of startups will compete to get sucked into those gargantuan organisations and we won't get the same crop of dynamic and colorful business leaders that used to characterize Silicon Valley.
That is one, very obvious scenario. However, the expected scenarios often don't come through quite as expected so I'm looking forward to picking out the new leaders. Let me know if you have any suggestions on who might be in the ranks of the new Silicon Valley/tech leadership.
By Tom Foremski - April 25, 2006 | Permalink | Category: Silicon Valley
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Comments (4)
I realise it is hard to dump 'old' thinking, especially when it's become part of a company's DNA.
But are you not assuming the 'old' management techniques will simply be re-imposed by the next gen leaders? What about the way 37Signals goes about its business?
I accept that very large companies face complex challenges but if we take into account the real influence the likes of Nolan and Scoble are having on their repsective companies then maybe there is something in Management 2.0 as a metaphor for fundamental change that reflects current conditions.
We're living with techniques worked out more than 50 years ago. They're no longer relevant. There are some really smart people thinking about this.
Posted: April 26, 2006 9:06 AM
That's very true Dennis, 50 year old management techniques don't work in the "new rules" world. The influence Scoble and Nolan are having in their own organisations is very interesting because their organisations are standing back and giving them the freedom to take things where they need to go. That takes courage because traditional organizations want control over everything. Scoble is certainly an 800 pound gorilla (on a $100k salary) within his organization but that kind of power does bring resentment from others...
Posted: April 26, 2006 11:16 AM
I'm interested in seeing ths impact on the examples you mention. Having said that Scoble told me this medium is changing HR practices which I was able to verify.
Over my place, we have been discussing ROI issues attached to this medium. These are leading to fresh discussions on issues around measurement and judgment.
David Maister is very good on this.
At the moment, there's a lot of theorising, coming together, then splintering as 'us'' 50-somethings try and get our heads around squaring traditional measurement as the corner stone for management to something morphed to reflect the new world. It's not easy.
There are always the trolls - but they get filtered out pretty quickly.
Posted: April 30, 2006 7:51 PM
Dennis Howlett was kind enough to give me a "shout-out" here, so I thought I'd jump in. I have to report that I am seeing a lot more talk than action in "new" ways of managing. For example,many of the consulting firms love to talk about new philosophies, but you'd be amazed (maybe you wouldn't) about how old-school they can be when it comes to running their own business.
We do, of course, as we know, see innovation in management (as in all things) in small, entrepreneurial firms. But once they start getting big, once they start beiong accountable to Wall Street (and once they start looking to mergers as solutions to their competitive issues) then "size-itis" and 50-to-100-year old management approaches return.
IT firms are not immubne - they end up being run hy the (short-term) numbers like evrybody else. The reason is that it takes COURAGE to bet on the long term, and when you suddenly have a big business to protect, courage flies out the window.
Posted: May 10, 2006 6:29 PM