Brett Colbert's Blog

First thing first. There is absolutely no data or facts behind my theory on why Mark Hurd left HP. It is 100% pure conjecture on my part. No data, no information - just 100% made up. I have been trying to figure out how HP could have lost such a super star CEO. I have been tracking Hurd's progress since he took over after Carly. Like many people, I have been totally amazed by his ability to grow an already enormous company. To me, he is the perfect blend of sales and operations and he demonstrated that over the years at HP. Apparently he is not well liked but no change-agent is and HP needed a major refactor. The following is a story about the reason he left. I use the word "story" because it's completely fictional. Mark Hurd joined HP around March 2005 so he has been there over 5 years. He has battled the old HP culture, streamlined and produced fantastic results in the form of revenue/expense. Along the way he's made enemies internally and probably angered

With all the talk about "IT agility", you would think that the only thing holding corporate IT back from moving quickly are external forces like funding and resources. I actually think some Corporate IT teams might actually avoid being agile. Here are the top five reasons: 1) Agility means risk. Optimally this is calculated risk but regardless it is still risk and risk makes people nervous. Unless IT leadership supports and rewards risk taking, it will not happen. Not all risk taking leads to something successful so people avoid it unless they get air-cover from their leadership team. 2) Agility requires speed. Good decisions in IT typically takes time. IT teams usually follow some sort of Project Lifecycle process which typically follows a "waterfall development model". Scrum or Agile development radically changes the typical waterfall model that most IT teams follow when doing projects. Unless IT leadership supports an iterative development model, IT will cont