Mark Hurd-Part Two
September 13, 2010
Mark Hurd was named last week co-President at Oracle, a competitor to Hewlet Packard from which he had been “forced” to resign.
My first reaction was “good for him and for Oracle.” I can imagine that the Board of HP has second thoughts about the decision to let him go.
HP is suing Mark Hurd to stop him from taking the job at Oracle. The suit claims that Hurd, by accepting to position at Oracle will violate the confidentiality agreement he signed in return for the $40 M + of his severance package. HP is afraid that Mark will divulge some HP proprietary information.
Loyalty is a very important value.
John Ladd, professor of Philosophy at Brown Universtiy wrote in the Macmillan Encyclopaedia of Philosophy in 1967 that the notion of loyalty is “an essential ingredient in any civilized and humane system of morals”.
That is true in the business world as well. Josiah Royce, the American Philospher wrote in The Philosophy of Loyalty that “in the commercial world, honesty in business is a service, not merely and not mainly to the others who are parties to the single transaction in which at any one time this faithfulness is shown. The single act of business fidelity is an act of confidence of man in man upon which the whole fabric of business rests.”
We are expected to be loyal to our family, friends and country. We are also expected to be loyal to our current employer.
However because of the reality of the job marketplace we often are required to shift our loyalties.
Such shifting of loyalty happens all the time in many different professions. Prosecutors become criminal defense attorneys, IRS officials become tax advisors, and Congressmen become lobbyists. In the PR industry, executives often represent clients that are competitor of previous clients or move to competitor agencies.
Can we shift loyalty and still remain ethical?
I think you can but there are at least three moral (and maybe legal) obligations to fulfill.
- One should not breach past confidence from the previous employer to the advantage of the new employer
- One should never malign previous employers.
- One should honor any past commitments that are still applicable.
The person we are ultimately accountable to is our self. We owe it to ourselves, wherever we are employed to keep our values, integrity and honesty wherever we are ant in whatever we say and do.
As the Psalmist David once wrote:
“Do not let loyalty and faithfulness forsake you: bind them around the your neck, write them on the tablet of your heart.”
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