Hurd Joins Oracle – An Ethical Strike Three?

We wrote earlier about the dismissal of HP CEO Mark Hurd for ethics violations.  We were reminded of a previous ethics mess that Hurd was tied to at the time that he was President of HP.  His role in that issue was rewarded by his being elevated to CEO. 

At the time of his departure from HP, Hurd’s expertise as a master cost cutter – squeezing R&D budgets to drives up profit margins – were highly touted.  Hurd’s ethics didn’t seem to matter as long as he was successful in the business arena.  It took as second ethical misstep in the form of an embarrassing sex scandal to dethrone Hurd at HP.

Now, Hurd enters a third questionable ethics situation:  he has accepted the job of co-president at Oracle, violating the confidentiality agreements that he signed before accepting a sizable severance package. Ironically Hurd replaces Charles Phillips, who is leaving Oracle after his own, much publicized, sex scandal.   There is no doubt that Hurd is privy to very sensitive strategic information concerning HP’s trade secrets, confidential information, and competitive strategies against Oracle.  However, California is notorious for its non-enforcements of non-competes, which Oracle is banking on. 

Once again, we see that situational ethics dominates in the business news of the day.  Situational Ethics is a belief that all truths are relative.  This, however, and thankfully, is not a universal belief.  Albert Einstein said it best: “Relativity applies to physics, not ethics.”