Beyond Memories #6: The Princess and the Boulder

Andy Grove was well known for his “paranoia”, and particularly his fear that success could make him (and Intel) complacent.  Circa 1995, he saw proof positive of just that right outside his cubicle window: a half-filled employee parking lot at 8:30AM.  

Intel employees were “wandering in” at 8:30 or even 9:00 -- long past the 8:00 start time that had been an Intel staple for more than two decades.  The crisis needed to be addressed, and when his senior management team did not turn the problem around fast enough, Andy took matters into his own hands. He reinstated a mandatory, no exception, 8:0AM start time throughout what was now a very global company.

I had heard murmurings about the upcoming policy change, but was nevertheless apoplectic when I heard the actual news.  On a flight to the far east on a Saturday afternoon, I crafted a note to Intel’s Darth Vader.  How could a self proclaimed meritocracy like Intel consider a mandatory start time? 

How could Intel care about when I arrived at the headquarters building,  as long as I was getting results?  How could they, or more specifically he, not take into account the early morning hours at home when I spoke with my colleagues in Europe, or the late night conversations with those in the East?  

How could he not understand that this mean that I, and doubtless thousands of other women (and men) would no longer be able to take their children to school in the morning, talk with other parents and their teachers?

This was an arbitrary, capricious, and deleterious invocation of Grove and Intel’s seemingly blind commitment to  “discipline” over all other principles:  results orientation, great place to work, service to the customer etc.  

Those with more Intel experience, counseled me to let it go.  Get on board or get out.  Andy would never change his mind on this one.  Except of course there was that legendary tale of Andy changing heart re: his edict of “no showers at intel”.    I thought that if I had any hopes of rolling back the new policy, I would have to take on Andy Grove directly.   

I thought in terms of a Kamikaze run.  Although I knew one could disagree with Andy without dire consequences, I knew that if I didn’t make him understand, I would look become an uncontrollably insubordinate.  I would certainly “lose it”, and quit or be fired.  

Andy and I had our first run-ins on the subject over email.  I told him that he didn’t get it, and he didn’t really understand what it meant to lead a meritocracy.  He told me I was behaving like the Princess and the Pea.  I told him I couldn’t get my mattress around this boulder.  I told him the reinstatement of the 8:00AM in-office requirements would be as effective as IBM’s return to red ties and pinstripe suits had been (not very!).

After several days of email jabs, Andy proposed an in-person meeting with clear guidelines  e.g. in public, he got 50% of the airtime etc.  Those guidelines were quickly abandoned as I lost it, and my dignity and self respect in the process.  I didn’t quit or get fired.  But within days,  I got got called in to see Craig Barrett.  As the COO and disciplinarian and quasi enforcer (and likely co-conspirator if not instigator of the 8:00AM mandate I was railing against), Craig seemed unswayed by my arguments.  I again contemplated options beyond Intel.  

To my astonishment Intel soon announced a policy change, making start times the prerogative of employees and their management. Even more amazing, I got one of the legendary “Andygram”s --  a personal handwritten note from Grove.  In it was an apology for the decision and the way the matter had been handled.

Sadly, I no longer have that note.   I do have the sense that sometimes even hysteria doesn’t undermine a good argument made to an open-minded listener.  More importantly, the best and the brightest are open to compelling arguments, ready to learn and even change course.

To this day, I wear the mantra of “The Princess and the Pea/Boulder” as well as the title Intel Fellow, a position I was appointed to about two years after this incident.  This is a pic of the Intel women execs (and fellow) from ~1998