Page 120 - MS Year in Review 2020

and was suitably impressed. In my view, it was the best managed company I had

ever seen… by far! Its talent was awesome. For example, I will never forget the
person who was responsible for “Benefits” at IBM. I recall his name but that is not
important. What is important is that I judged that he was the equivalent to

managers I had met who were running companies and divisions at other
companies! During a reception prior to dinner that evening off site of the IBM
campus, I spoke with the then SVP of HR, Walt Burdick, who was also very

impressive. I mentioned how impressed I was with “Jim P,” the head of benefits.
He understood my implied point immediately. His answer staggered me. He said

simply, “People are important at IBM, and Benefits are important to people. We
want someone in that role who will do a good job. Jim will get other assignments
later.” The implications were again staggering. For many, if not all companies at

that time, human resource management was a bit of backwater. The most talent
people were not in human resource management. IBM was so deep in talent that

they had a division caliber manager managing Benefits!

As follow up to that initial visit, I was invited to do several consulting projects for

IBM, I was even more impressed. For example, I was invited to do a then
confidential project involving a scan of the literature to assess the economic,
political, technological, and other factors on IBM from 1985 to the year 2000. It was

a nine-month study, and then I presented my findings to IBM in a report and at a
meeting in upper New York State near Armonk. At that time, other companies were

considering the possibility of doing strategic planning, but here was IBM doing a 15
year “Environmental Scan!” I subsequently learned that they had already done a
similar study internally, and they wanted an objective external look at the same

issues! What an amazing company.

It’s the Culture, Stupid!

How could a company so deep in talent and so forward thinking like IBM decline?

Yet it did, and, in retrospect, as I analyzed it, I understood the subtle flaw the led
IBM into decline. The problem was, ironically, the vaunted IBM culture.

119
© Management Systems Consulting Corporation, 2020. All rights reserved