08/17/2010 (2:03 pm)
Poll: HP right to force Mark Hurd to resign
The majority of people in a new poll say the Hewlett-Packard Co. board was right to force CEO Mark Hurd to resign over an ethics scandal.
Of the respondents, 55 percent said HP (NYSE: HPQ) did the right thing in forcing Hurd to resign, while 33 percent said he should not have been forced out. The remainder were undecided.
Hurd spent 25 years in Dayton with NCR Corp. (NYSE: NCR) before leaving to join HP in 2005. While at NCR, he also headed up the data warehouse division that was spun off into Miami Township-based Teradata Corp. (NYSE: TDC).
One person who voted in the survey said, "CEO's today, as never before, must demonstrate through their behavior exemplary values; integrity, responsibility and accountability to name a few."
Another person took the opposite view, saying "The HP board needs to be replaced. They failed on Fiorino, they failed on Dunn, the other board member who resigned, and now we are led to believe they failed on Hurd. No one knows exactly what Hurd did anyway. And the company lost $8 billion in value on the stock drop?"
In further breaking down the results, 47 percent said they agreed with what HP did because CEO's should be held to the same standard as other employees. However, 28 percent said he should only have been reprimanded.
"I don't think we have the whole story. It is possible the Board wanted him out and this was a objective means to achieve their goal," said another person who commented on the poll.
The BizPulse Survey ran Aug. 11 to Aug. 14 on the Dayton Business Journal Web site and had 186 responses. While not a scientific poll, it reveals the attitude of the business community in the days following the announcement of Hurd's departure.
For more on this story, including Hurd's full connections to Dayton through the years, click the following DBJ stories in our continuing coverage:
Mark Hurd - Rise and fall of a CEO
Report: Mark Hurd agrees to pay settlement
Hewlett-Packard stock plummets on CEO scandal
HP CEO Hurd to get $12M severance payout
Full text of Mark Hurd's separation agreement with HP
HP CEO Mark Hurd resigns amid sexual harassment scandal
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